Borders Broken down
by SomeBITGamer
Summary: A misconfigured gap between Gensokyo and the real world has been opened. Someone from our world will have to go through the Touhou series to fix the gap. Read as he struggles to get past the challenges and the intensity of the games. Rate/Review Please!
1. Learning About the Incident

**A.N: I do not own any of the following characters except for my own character. Inspired by EtherDrone and a big thanks to her! Enjoy! I hope.**

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**_Chapter 1: Borders Broken Down_**

Sweat slowly crept down my face and hands as I completely focused on the screen ahead of me.

Bullets were scattered across the entire screen as I moved Yukari through the wave of bullets.

A quick peek to the right told me that I only had one life left with no bombs as I had spell bombed the previous fights.

My fingers was pressing against the arrow keys and responding with my eyesight. The shift and Z buttons were held down with my left hand.

I was fighting Eirin for the 7th time now, still unable to graze and dodge the bullets.

Come on! Just a couple more hits and she'll stop! I thought as I felt completely pressured at the oncoming bullets.

However, I missed one tiny bullet and it hit me. My face dropped and my heart sunk as Yukari blew up while I alt-tabbed out of my game.

"GAHHH! WHY THE HELL DO I SUCK AT THIS SO MUCH!" I thought, screaming into my mind knowing that no one would reply into my inner thoughts

and smacked my head with my hand. I felt the urge the pound onto my keyboard with my fist.

Touhou game number 8. Imperishable Night. Known as the easiest game of the series.

But why was it that I stunk so bad at Touhou? I was still attempting to beat easy mode and that was probably my 7th try.

Most people beat it on their first, worst case scenario being the 2nd try. But me. Not me. I was still on easy mode. I was using extra lives too!

My name is Akyris Nanoko. It's a strange name, but I take pride in it. I'm a normal human just like anybody else. I usually try to do the right thing

and solve problems that are really mandatory. Sometimes though, I'll get arrogant, but usually only if I'm completely sure I can back my

arrogance up. I'm age 17, senior in high school.

I sighed sadly to myself at my once again, failed attempt to beat Touhou 08.

"Well, maybe you should just relax for the night. It's almost 10 you know." Lokon said trying to calm me down from my touhou rage.

Well, I guess he's right. Raging at a game isn't going to make me get any better at it and sleep sounded great right about now.

"By the way, how are you going to get home without my parents catching you Lokon?" I roughly asked, still trying to get rid of the excess anger out of my voice.

I slowly climbed onto my bed and sat, staring at Lokon's figure as he opened my window.

"I am Lokon! I can't be caught!" Lokon joked while giving off a slight grin as he looked at me.

Ahh, the usual "Lokon owns all" that he says during everything that shouldn't be really possible.

"You better be careful Lokon. Julius Caesar got just as confident and look where it got him." I jested back and poked him as we both muffled our

laughs as we did not want my parents waking up to catch us.

I wasn't even supposed to be up and Lokon, he does his own thing, but what he said was true. He never did get caught, and if he did, he would

make some kind of elaborate excuse for him being there. He sure was good with it.

"Well, I better get going Akyris. See ya tomorrow dude!" Lokon said as he jumped through the window onto my roof and jumped down while I laid

back against my bed and pillow with my arms behind my head.

As I continued to lay down in an attempt to sleep, my mind wandered off back to Touhou and its extreme crazyness of fun of dodging the mass

spread bullets. The complete awesomeness of it continued to fill my mind even as I closed my eyes. The spell cards, the patterns, the bullets, all of

these fueled my urge to go back to my computer and play Touhou Eiyashou.

Ok! That's it! I thought while getting back up from my bed. I was going to play Imperishable Night one last time before sleeping!

"I know I can beat Eirin this time!" I grumbled to myself as I walked over to my computer, turning it on and waiting on my chair for a while.

...

1 Hour later

...

Eirin, you must truly hate me. I thought as I felt angry for once again failing, and exited the game. I left my computer on due to my sheer tiredness

and my urge to sleep

"Grr. I'm just going to go to sleep." I said to myself while slowly calming down as I laid facedown onto my pillow and spread my arms out in a tired fashion.

Soon, sleep overcame me, and my mind exited the real world to have its vacation in the dream the world.

...

A red flash came from my computer screen.

?

"Ugh, what the?" I grumbled, annoyed that something or someone woke me up from my sleep.

I slowly turned my head and blinked my eyes slowly to regain my eyesight.

"What is that?" I asked to no one in particular as I rubbed my eyes with my hands to see if I was hallucinating.

I wasn't.

"What's going on?" I asked knowing that no one would answer my question.

It seemed to draw me in as one of my arms slowly reached out for it and I swore that it was calling me.

My body moved by itself by an unknown force, towards the red computer screen. I had no control over it, nor could I possibly sleep now.

"What the heck am I doing?" I questioned myself not knowing why I was slowly walking toward my computer screen.

My finger touched the computer screen and the water dribbled ever so lightly.

Wait what?

DID IT JUST DRIBBLE?

"It did dribble!" I whispered to myself, excited for some reason.

GAHH!

MY HAND!

IT SUCKED IT IN!

IT'S STUCK INSIDE MY COMPUTER!

I completely struggled to pull my hand out, but the screen just kept pulling me in even further eventually reaching my arm.

My thoughts just focused on one thing. And that was to pull my arm out.

I hooked my left arm onto the desk in order to get support to pull my arm out, but it was completely stuck in there!

"GAHHHHHH!" I screamed as my arm gave up and I was completely swallowed by the darkness of my monitor.

...

"NGGH!" I forced my eyes open to look around where I was.

A japanese styled rooftop? By the hardness of it, I say I'm on solid floor.

It looks like the sun is up.

And 2 cute girls were looking at me. They looked pretty worried.

Maybe it was for me. I thought, mentally getting a nosebleed on a girl worrying over me.

One of the girls had a mop hat with yellowish or blondish hair. The other girl has brown hair with a black hat.

"Renko, are you sure we should have him help us?" asked the girl in the blond yellow hair. Her voice sounded soft and very kind with no hint of

any malice in it.

So the girl with the brown hair was Renko. Nice name for a cute girl, but I'll stop there.

"Well, it's who we dragged in so I guess we don't have a choice." Renko said with a defeated sigh.

"Umm ok."

God. My body felt like complete crap and my head was spinning around in circles. I tried to get up, but my body only said to just lay down.

"Try not to move so much stranger. You probably don't feel very good right now and I can feel ya." said Renko with a slight tone of sympathy.

She laid her arm on my shoulder and it relaxed back down onto the wooden floor.

"Who are you guys? And where am hell am I?" I asked having slight difficulty asking it because of my slight moment of weakness. Slightly was only an

understatement right about now.

"Basic questions first huh? All right. First question. I'm Renko and the girl in the purple dress with the mop hat is Maribel, my friend." Renko

explained pointing to herself and Maribel as she introduced themselves.

"Second question. That's pretty complicated, but I'll try to explain it as best as possible. You're inbetween the border of a world you've probably

never seen, and your world, the real world." Renko tried explaining to me saying it as if it we're a regular event.

"In between a border? What?" I asked, confused at her words.

"Your on the borders of a world not known to anyone and your world." explained Renko attempting to explain to me once again that there was

another world co-existing.

"So, I'm on the borderline of one world and another?" I asked for clarification.

"Basically like that, yes." Renko confirmed my doubts.

Ahh, I see

There's only one explanation for this.

"Like hell I believe that! This has to be a dream!" I screamed, coughing slightly after my yell.

"If this was a dream, would you be feeling pain for coughing? Isn't this a little too real to be a dream?" Renko replied, acting slightly cold to my doubts toward them.

"You are Akyris-san correct?" Maribel asked me with pure innocence written all over her face.

"Thats right. How did you now my name Maribel?" I asked with pure confusion on my face on how Maribel knew my name.

"I will explain later Akyris-san, for now we need your assistance." Maribel replied.

"Why? What's wrong?" I said asking the obvious question.

"This will be a long story so please be patient Akyris-san. Would you like some tea while listening to the story?" Maribel offered, standing up to

prepare to get tea if I agreed.

"Sure. I guess a little tea wouldn't hurt." I accepted, and Maribel left to go prepare some tea while Renko sat down next to me.

"I'll start off while she's off then. Maribel and I have been trying to get into Gensokyo for a while now using experiments. Maribel has the power to

see the borders and that's where things got out of hand.

**Flashback Start**

"It's over here right Maribel?" Asked Renko impatiently to ensure that this was the place where they could open a gap to Gensokyo.

"Yes, I'm sure it's over here Renko." Replied Maribel in her usual kindness to her friend.

"Ok. Let's set it up here then." Said Renko eagerly.

...

"Ok! We're finally done setting this up. What this should do is send a massive shockwave disrupting the boundary of this area and force it to open

a gap to Gensokyo." Renko said with clear confidence that there would be no failure.

"This sounds simple enough Renko. Go ahead and start the machine please." Maribel asked, also eager that this would finally be their chance to enter Gensokyo.

"All right! Power... ON!" Renko said with enthusiasm filling her voice, even raising her arm into the air once she clicked the button to start up the machine.

*WHIRRR!

The gears in the machine started and it started shaking a little bit. Maribel and Renko decided to have a seat on a nearby rock while waiting for

the machine to do it's objective.

After a few seconds, the machine turned orange and smoke rose from all over it, forcing Renko to run back behind the rock with Maribel for cover.

"TAKE COVER!" Screamed Renko as she dived behind the rock with Maribel to shield herself from the upcoming explosion.

The machine started to shrivel up as if packing itself, then suddenly, exploded, releasing the many bolts and nuts. Parts flew through the air,

landing against various things such as rocks and trees and bushes.

However, a crack in the air that replaced the area of the machine, could be seen.

Machine parts were scattered everywhere, smoking against the trees and the surrounding area.

However, after the smoke had cleared up, a hole could be seen from the blast. It looked like a rip in the sky, and it was pure black. The rip simply

floated in the air, motionless as if waiting for someone to enter it's domain. "Look Maribel, there's the gap! Come on, let's go!" Renko said

excitedly pointing towards the open rift in front of them.

Renko grabbed Maribel's arm and dragged her over to the gap stopped just in front of it.

"Umm, Renko. I don't think that this is a good idea. Our machine did explode to pieces and who knows what lays on the other side of this gap."

Maribel commented, doubting whether they should enter the rip.

"What are you talking about Maribel? It has to be the gap to Gensokyo! How else would there be a gap here? Come on Maribel!" Renko

exclaimed, grabbing Maribel's arm, and jumped into the open hole.

"Ugh..." Groaned Renko as she slowly raised her head against the grass.

"Ow..." Groaned Maribel as well.

Maribel slowly stood up, slightly dizzy from the small fall from the gap she and Renko had jumped through.

"Umm. Renko, I don't think this is Gensokyo." Maribel commented, helping her friend off of the floor.

Renko slowly used Maribel's shoulder as support to stand up and to steady herself.

Both looked around to see a forest surrounding them.

It looked completely normal enough. Maribel had saw in a dream that she entered a forest, specifically, the Forest of Magic, though she had no

clue what it was.

"It doesn't feel as if we've crossed the border Renko." Maribel said, giving her a sad look and both of them sighed.

"How can ya tell Maribel?" Renko asked clearing doubting her friend's previous comment.

"I just can Renko. I can see the boundary of areas, yet the boundary to cross into our world is over there. Gensokyo's rift is here, but can't be

seen." Maribel explained to her friend who was fuming on how they didn't make it through.

"So, are you saying that we're in between the borders of our world and Gensokyo?" Renko asked worriedly, hoping with dear life that Maribel

would answer with a no.

"Unfortunately yes. It's the only explanation on how we're not in Gensokyo yet." Maribel answered with a frown on her face, upset that the

method they had attempted to use to enter Gensokyo had failed.

"Well, how are we supposed to enter Gensokyo and close the gap between this... world and ours." Renko asked, hoping that there could still be

some way to enter Gensokyo.

"Also, what if someone found this gap Renko?" Maribel asked with a little tinge of fear in her voice.

No comment was made between any of the girls as they just gazed at each other.

**Flashback End**

"And that's why we need your help Akyris-san." Maribel said, finally entering the scene with 2 tea cups, having overheard Renko's explanation to me.

"Ahh, thank you Maribel." I graciously accepted the tea cup.

"So to sum all of this up, the reason I have to do this is because your machine failed to open the border correctly?" I asked for clarification.

Maribel only turned her gaze down and slowly nodded. Anger started filling me up, as I did not want to pick up after someone's mess. However,

I knew that to call another person here for their assistance, the problem that they created must be crucial.

"Here's what I think about this. How the hell am I supposed to believe that Gensokyo coexists with our world! You said this wasn't a dream! But wasn't Gensokyo a fictional world where incidents would happen?" I asked, voicing my doubts with a slight tone of anger in it.

"Gensokyo has always been there Akyris-san. Most people just never saw it or thought about it. I can see the boundaries of it though. Gensokyo

exists without a doubt." Maribel calmly replied with a seemingly rare tone of determination as Renko just glanced at her questioningly for a moment.

That seemed to calm me down. Thanks Maribel.

"Still, I always thought it was only a series of fun games created by ZUN." I commented.

"Yes. I do not know who ZUN is, but the games that he has created are rather incredibly similar to the incidents in Gensokyo." Maribel said in a

thinking pose.

"If you simply don't want to help, this could prove disastrous. After all, what if someone discovered the gap?" Maribel asked me while crossing her

arms.

Renko just took a sip out of her tea cup as if these kind of unfortunate events were regular.

That's unfortunately true. If someone had found the gap, they may tell the authorities and it could lead to more catastrophic effects. I unwillingly

admitted to myself.

I sighed, though it felt strange to sigh face up rather than standing up. I couldn't believe I was agreeing with them even though there's really no solid proof.

To calm my nerves down, I took a sip from the tea cup.

This really doesn't taste too bad. A little on hot side, though I never was good at hot things. I thought, silently complimenting Maribel's expertise

at tea.

"Fine. I'll help." I said with a complete tone of defeat.

"Thank you very much Akyris-san!" Maribel thanked me, also bowing down to me.

"What are you doing Maribel? Get up. I'm not really to be respected you know. After all, isn't this the right thing to do?" I said quickly, trying to

reach my arm toward her from my downed figure to gesture her to stop her bowing.

"As long as you'll help Akyris, you'll have our respect. I don't think many people would have just believed us without concrete proof ya know."

Renko said while giving a big smile towards me.

At this point, it would be just plain cruel of me to just refuse.

...

Silence

The only things that broke the silence were the occasional sounds of sipping tea.

I really should ask Maribel on how she made this. I thought, wanting more of this great drink that had delighted my tongue.

"So, how am I supposed to close this gap?" I finally asked, doubting their purpose since they had not explained to me what I had to do.

"Ya play those, touhou games right? Is that what they're called? I remember having a look at one of them." Renko asked, slightly annoyed at me for not waiting for their instructions.

"Yes. It's called touhou, why?" I asked the obvious question.

"Well, those touhou games are incredibly accurate with the incidents that go on inside of Gensokyo. Maribel and I think that if you resolve the

incidents once again, the gap should start getting repaired." Renko explained to me, while taking a sip from her tea cup.

"Well, why can't you enter the games yourselves? You wouldn't really need me here if you could do this yourself." I asked, wondering why they would ask me for help rather than do it themselves.

Or are you just lazy girls and would rather have me do it.

"We WOULD fix this gap ourselves, and we have tried to enter the games. However, we can't enter for some reason." Renko explained, putting emphasis on the would 'would' to probably prove her point that they couldn't enter.

"Renko and I think it's because of the shockwave from the malfunction of the machine that it won't let us enter. It was meant to disrupt the border and force it open, but as it didn't work and exploded, the shockwave released must have had another effect on us." Maribel logically concluded

with a scientific mask that covered her face.

Wow. To figure that much within that one event. These girls are really intelligent. They even look around my age. Damn asians. Though I am one too.

My mind went in circles on how to digest all this information.

"Who knew those games were so significant to the world. " I joked, making both girls slightly giggle, easing up the tensity slightly.

"Back to business though, in order to resolve the incidents once again, you're going to assimilate as one of the girls who solved the incidents. Each time you solve an incident, the gap between Gensokyo and your world should start fixing itself."

Renko said, explaining to me what was going to happen in the game.

"What do you mean, assimilate?" I asked in confusion on what she meant.

"What I mean is, you're going to take over the role of one of the girls who solved the incident. You'll be taking over their body and powers. That way, you won't be completely defenseless.

Ok, so I was going to play as one of the girls in her body.

...

I WAS GOING TO ASSIMILATE AS ONE OF THE GIRLS!

I think my mind exploded right there.

"Uhhh, are all the people who saved Gensokyo females?" I nervously asked Renko, hoping that maybe there would be at least 1 guy among them.

My perverted side of my mind just told me that it was the perfect chance to accurately check out every girl that I assimilated with.

"Yes, they're all going to be girls Akyris." Renko answered with an evil grin on her face, practically telling me that if I did something wrong with the

girl, I would be maimed and brutally beaten down.

And just as instant did my "evil side" come, so did it disappear with Renko's warnings.

Renko just sips from her tea cup again as if she didn't really care for me.

"I-I see..." I stuttered, with my heart completely sinking into the bottom pit of my stomach.

All the people who resolved the incidents of Gensokyo were all girls.

Did that mean that there were absolutely no guys in Gensokyo who could defend themselves?

ZUN, just for this one moment, I hate you.

"In about 2 days, you're going to get into your first incident solving Akyris-san. You will be gapped into one of the touhou games and assimilate

into one of the resolvers. Please be prepared for it." Maribel told me, giving me a heads up and when to expect it.

"Ahh, I'll be sure to stay hidden when I get teleported then!" I said, making a note to try and not make any new friends while my gap problem

was in effect.

"Remember Akyris, use these two days well to familiarize with anyone you might need to from Gensokyo. You can never be too prepared." Renko

advised me while wagging her finger at me like I was a dog.

"And before we leave you, remember not to tell anyone what we told you here as it may spread rumors!' Maribel said before I instantly somehow,

fell asleep after she touched me on my head.

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**A.N: Whatcha think? This is my first story and I honestly tried my best so please, any reviews or advice or tips would always be nice! I'm probably going to take a long time to update the next chapter because of all my personal things. Thanks for reading! Credits to the person who let me use his character! He has my full respect! This was edited!  
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	2. Further Understanding of the Incident

**AN: Yes! Another Chapter in. I woke up really early to fnish this for some reason. I guess it was because I just couldn't sleep with all these ideas running through my head**

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**Chapter 2: Questions answered**

**Real World: Home**

...

"Zzzz." I snored with drool coming out from one of the corners of my mouth.

RINNNNGGGGGG!

"GAHHH!" I screamed, forcing my head off of my soft floor.

I was on the floor?

What was I doing on the floor?

My body was sprawled against the ground with a slight wet spot on it.

I slowly got up from the floor and smashed my alarm clock so it would stop its irritating ringing.

That's better. I thought to myself as I sat on my bed.

Those 2 girls must have sent me back to my room.

"Ahh, I remember!" I said to myself, slowly recalling what Maribel and Renko had told me.

My mind slowly pieced together the conversations and the problems that Maribel and Renko told me about and how I fell asleep because Maribel's soft hand touched my head.

Man, I'm probably the craziest man or teenager alive because I'm doubting that a fictional world that shouldn't exist, actually is. And that's all because of 2 girls who told me their explanation of their little accident.

"No matter how you look at it, it's all their fault I got sucked into this mess. Geez, and no matter which way you look at it, this all seems so stupid and unrealistic!" I whined, thinking of all the negative things to come while I was in a female's body.

Then something clicked into my mind.

Hey wait a second. How do they know where my house is? I thought with slight suspicion that they were stalking me.

I'll just discuss that with them another time. I thought, making note of that.

I turned my head and looked over at my alarm clock telling me that it was still a little too early in the morning.

I'm was probably never going to sleep now with all the ... things that keep bothering me.

There's only one way to keep me busy until it's time to go to school.

Early morning gaming time!

I quickly noticed that my computer screen was not flashing red as it was last night as I slowly walked over to my computer.

I hit the power button to turn on my computer, turned on my computer screen, and waited patiently for everything to boot up.

As I was waiting, my mind continuously wandered back to Renko and Maribel's explanation of Gensokyo.

There was absolutely no way I was going to believe that Gensokyo existed without concrete proof

I found my own hands gripping itself into a fist, making my hands turn into a pale white color.

Ahh.

It's done booting up.

I'll just think about this later.

Gaming time!

I booted up Imperishable Night and put my mind into what I called, focus mode. Not that it does anything. I just liked to call it that.

All right, here we go!

...

Crap! I died again.

Game over huh? At Eirin again too. I made it farther, but my pride was still hurt from being beaten by an enemy that wasn't even real.

Is that what was going to happen to me if I fail to solve the incidents?

Wait what?

No! Gensokyo isn't real! That can't be! I kept denying in my mind, even though Renko and Maribel clearly stated that it was very real.

I peered over to my computer clock, mentally thanking the inanime object that it was time for me to pack up for school so I could keep my mind off of Gensokyo.

I turned off my computer screen, leaving the computer on as I was lazy to turn it off, and went downstairs to go back into the realities of life.

**At school...**

"And so, this was why the persians could not break the spartan's defense, even if they..." The teacher, Mrs. Onomura droned on even though I was slowly succumbing to sleep's grasp.

History, honestly for me, sucked. I never worked well with it, even if I found myself poking fun at it. My mind simply couldn't remember the ancient history of the world.

Suddenly, my mind started to daydream about going to Gensokyo, and escaping the cruel realities of life.

Agh. I was thinking about Gensokyo, even at school.

Ugh, I'm going to try sleeping. I thought, leaning my head against my arm in a comfortable fashion to take a small nap.

"MR. NANOKO! WAKE UP THIS INSTANT!" Mrs. Onomura yelled at me, forcing my head to jerk up instantly while everyone stared at me, making me feel very nervous.

"Well, since it appears you clearly know what I have been talking about, answer this question for me, . Stand up please and answer this. The Spartans used a certain formation to protect themselves from arrows to move in closer to the Persians. What formation was this called?" Mrs. Onomura asked me coldly, as if I was the most hated person on Earth.

Obviously, I didn't know the answer and I turned my gaze downwards in shame while waiting for Mrs. Onomura to punish me.

"This is why sleeping in my class is strictly prohibited! Detention after school at 2:15. Do not think about being late this time Mr. Nanoko." She said, emphasising the word late, to ensure that I would not miss it.

I sat back down quickly, silently cursing to myself.

I had detention with Mrs. Onomura several times before, but somehow, this one had particularly made me more irritated than usual.

"Dude, what's wrong with you?" Lokon asked me with concern. "Did something happen or something?"

I opened my mouth to tell him what was wrong, but I instantly recalled the warning that Renko and Maribel had told me.

"Please do not tell anyone about the gap as that may lead into someone discovering it, possibly leading to a catastrophe. The less people know, the better."

"I just didn't get enough sleep Lokon. Don't worry too much about it." I quietly lied, hoping he would buy it.

"Did you stay up playing Imperishable Night again even after I left man? You really should take a break from that if you're starting to drop in school." Lokon said, buying my lie after all.

"Yeah, yeah." I replied quickly to end the conversation.

**After School**

Finally, detention is over.

I started walking in the direction of my house, until I saw purple flash against the trees.

?

I started walking in the direction of the purple flash, and as I did, it started getting brighter and brighter. Eventually, it stopped flashing and the light stayed permanently this time.

Geez, I go over here just because I got curious. What kind of a reason is that? I questioned myself as I continued walking in the purple light's direction.

Is that a clearing?

It looks like it is, and it even looks like the purple light stops here.

Finally, I stepped into the clearing, bracing my eyes to not freak out at anything strange that I saw.

Is that?

I stared at the clearing, appalled at what I saw.

Explosion marks filled the surrounding trees and a few machine parts were scattered in various places. In the biggest mark, a rip in the sky floated, waiting there with its black hole ready for anything that went in.

This must be the gap Renko and Maribel must have been talking about. I concluded, finally giving myself a internal sigh of relief.

Does this mean that their story was true? I wondered as I looked into the black gap that was floating in the air.

This most likely, would probably be where they dwelled since they had answered that I was at the border between Gensokyo and my world and they never said there were multiple gaps.

I walked over to the gap, jumped in and c losed my eyes as I felt like I was falling quickly through the air.

...

**Border Between Gensokyo and the Real World**

I reopened my eyes moments later to find myself at yet, another forest.

There's a house over there though. Somehow though, I felt as if this was a safe haven for me. A place to escape all my troubles and the cruelty of reality. The house seemed to welcome me as if I was a regular here. Was it the previous hospitality I had when I found myself over here?

Or was it something else...

It has to be Renko and Maribel's. Who else could live in here? I thought to myself, slowly walking toward's the japanese styled home.

Before I walk up the steps and reach to slide the door open however, the door opens from someone else and...

"Oh! Akyris-san! Welcome!" Maribel greeted me with a warm smile on her face.

Damn that's cute!

"Uhh, hello." I nervously reply with a slight tinge of red on my face. It took me all my strength to not fall down the stone stairs and get a nosebleed right there.

"Please. come in and sit down. Renko's in the living room drinking some tea." Maribel told me, gesturing me to follow her.

And so I did!

I followed her through the door, past the hallway, and into a series of rooms, before finally reaching Renko who was having a cup of tea while sitting down.

"Over here Akyris-san." Gestured Maribel, and as I came in through the door the closes it.

Tea must be really popular these days.

Oh, and Maribel goes back the way we came in.

"Hmm? Well, what do ya know? Akyris!" Renko exclaimed, standing up and walking over to me to greet me.

"Nice to see you too, Renko." I replied, smiling as I shook her hand.

"So what brings you into our home and the gap between Gensokyo and your world?" Renko asked me, most likely curious on how I got here.

"What brang me here was the ton of questions I have and the answers that I need." I answered in a rather dull tone.

"In that case, I'll answer depending on what question it is and if I have the answer." Renko commented rather seriously as her face changed from a happy greeting to a more business like one.

"Fair enough." I said, agreeing to her terms. "First, how am I supposed to believe that Gensokyo exists even if you told me that it clearly exists. I can't believe anything without solid proof. I really have to know because I might change my mind about helping."

Cute girls or not, answers are my top priority right now. I'm still so confused about so many things.

She looks like she expected this question to come.

"You don't have to believe whether it exists or not. On the 3rd day, you will be sent into one of the incidents as one of the girls who solved it. You can judge whether or not, it exists as I cannot prove anything here." Renko answers, while sipping from her tea cup.

Dang. She caught me there. I can't think of any way of how she could prove to me that Gensokyo exists without a personal look.

"I guess your right." I replied. " Next, why do I have to assimiliate as one of the girls who solved the incident. Can't I enter as my own person? I don't think it would be best for me to be in a female's body as I'm still a teenager with raging hormones you know. I'm only 17."

Renko giggles a little before answering my question.

"The reason you will enter as one of the girls is because if you enter as your own person, you may disrupt the actual timeline if you had entered personally." Renko answered my second question easily. "Also, if you enter personally, you would have no power or weapon to defend yourself against. As such, you have a higher risk of failing to solve the incident and dying. I also trust you not to mess around with the said girl.

Ok well, that automatically answers that question. I'd rather keep myself alive thank you. Also, having that much trust in me that I wouldn't do anything naughty just touches my heart. It really does. I couldn't help but mentally smile to myself.

Assimilating as one of the girls allows you to gain access to their weaponry if they have any, and the powers that they have." Renko added, saying all this with ease as if she had practiced this, though I knew that she had deducted this quite quickly.

So that's why you want me to take the place as one of the girls. You don't want me dead? I really envy your kindness. I wish I had that at times.

Finally, the last question that was continuously picking at my mind whenever my mind came back to the coversations I had with Renko and Maribel yesterday.

"Last question. Why me? Couldn't you have picked anyone who was more familiar with Gensokyo or touhou rather than me?" I asked with caution.

This could very well decide on my decision of whether I should help them seeing as Maribel and Renko can't close the gap themselves. This had better be really good.

"Honestly, Maribel gapped you here randomly. I even discussed if we could really ask you to help us. It was a risk we were willing to take because we can't risk another person knowing our secret. Sending you back without you at least knowing the situation on hand would have risked you telling someone. You at best, heard at least a couple lines of our discussion. Maribel said that she can't gap directly, so she had to use an object to amplify it. You can go ask her later if you really want to know." Renko explains to me with her arms crossed.

So they never had the leniency to pick who they wanted. If they did, I wouldn't have been picked. I can understand their point of view in all of this. I wouldn't want someone to know my secret too and have someone blab it to another person. Also, since we're dealing with a supernatural case, it was one more reason not to have me tell someone about it.

"Ok well, those were the three main questions I had that was bothering me throughout the day. Thank you for answering them." I said as I stood up and gave a respectful bow to Renko.

"Ahh, sit down Akyris. I'm not that old yet ya know?" Renko says as she stands up too and grabs my shoulder to have me sit down. "Seeing as you have your questions, I have my questions too and I would like to have them answered yeah?

"I'll answer them with your terms in effect." I state, hoping that it wouldn't be anything about my personal life.

"Agreed." Renko replied.

"First, why do you continue to believe that Gensokyo does not exist." She asks while setting her tea cup down on the table.

That was her question? I thought I made it obvious. I guess not.

"The reason I continue to believe that Gensokyo is not real and does not exist is because of how unrealistic it sounds. No matter which way it is looked, there is no direct evidence until I see it with my own eyes." I state rather bluntly, though it was the truth. I couldn't see how it was real. I guess I was more of a 'feel and experience' person than a 'see and hear.'

"I see. I understand though once you enter the games, you may judge for yourself if it is real." Renko says while pouring more tea into her empty tea cup.

"Second question then. Can I trust you to not tell anyone, no matter what, our secrets?" She asks very seriously, even putting her cup down and staring me in the eyes.

Talk about a death stare.

"Cross my heart and hope to die." I answer back, thinking that she would get what I was trying to say.

'What?" She asked me.

Guess not.

"You have my word. I will not tell anyone about this at all." I answer with all honesty, hoping that she would believe me.

"In that case, thank you very much Akyris." She says, giving one of those huge anime smiles at me.

I only fidget in embarassment as she smiles at me.

We continue to talk about the real world and other idle things that we liked, disliked, thought was weird, and more until the sun started setting over one of the hills

I look out the back door to notice that it was nearing sunset. Crap. Mom's not gonna be too happy when I show up. I had detention and was supposed to head straight home, but I guess this was worth it seeing as I had the answers I wanted to my questions.

"Well, Renko. It was a pleasure talking to you. I have to be going home though." I said, rather sad that I had to leave Renko instead of continuing the fun conversations we were having.

"Ahh well, come back anytime Akyris!" She says as I stand up and start walking toward the path I took to get in.

"One more thing Renko." I said to her.

"What is it?" She asks the obvious question.

"I will help you and Maribel to fix this gap!" I state rather loudly while continuing to walk towards the door out.

'Thank you so much Akyris." Renko thanks me and I see her huge anime smile as I turn around and look at her.

I pass by Maribel and said my farewells to her while giving her a smile before hopping back into the gap.

...

Real World

I landed better that time then when I jumped into the gap into the border didn't I?

I must be getting used to it.

I start my trek home, having my mind go over the fun conversation Renko and I had.

We talked as if we had known each other for days on end.

I make note to never take my status as friends with her for granted.

By the time I reach home, I don't even notice it and Mom scolds me for getting detention and for being late home.

I just rub my head in embarassment and have a nice dinner.

I really should learn how to cook. I think to myself before heading upstairs to the bathroom to do the usual body cleansing.

I slept all my stress off and my thoughts never came back to whether Gensokyo was real.

Honestly, I didn't know whether or not Gensokyo existed.

I was somehow, put at ease with the answers that Renko had given me.

I felt like it didn't matter whether it existed or not.

You would think that would count as a power, but nope. It's just her talking that happens to be very good.

...

**Timeskip: 2 days later**

RINNNGGGGGG!

I grabbed the alarm clock and threw it across the room making the ringing stop as it landed on the floor making no noise.

I got up from my bed funk and thought about the incident.

Maribel had explained to me yesterday that she was going to gap me the same way she had taken me to their home, except that I would enter one of the games instead and take control of a female's body, which I still felt incredibly shameful about. Renko and Maribel had wished me good luck and to have a safe trip. I really should come back and talk to them alot more often. They're a pretty nice set of girls and it wouldn't kill me to continue talking to them.

I would know that it would be time to go by the red screen on my computer screen once again and that I would have to enter it to enter the unknown world that would be Gensokyo.

**Timeskip: Night time**

School went the same as usual. Surprisingly, Mrs. Onomura didn't pick on me during one of the days, and my conversations with Lokon were fun filled once again.

Apparently he had pranked one of the teachers so that their seat would come apart the moment they sat on it. Everyone got a laugh out of that, and it made school bearable with the teachers piling up homework fast and the upcoming tests.

I honestly don't know where I would be without him. I would most likely be an emo guy with no friends if it was not for him.

The red screen is supposed to show up sometime soon.

And...

BINGO!

Red screen of death!

Oops wrong term. Well whatever.

I slowly walked over to the computer screen and touched it with my hand.

The computer screen dribbled like water like I had expected.

Well, I might as well get started. I thought, while slowly moving my body parts into the computer screen.

...

Aww crud, my hip was stuck against the border of the computer screen. My upper body was completely inside the computer screen while my lower body was stuck against the computer screen.

I tilted my body into a diagonal position and slowly pushed myself in, anticipating what dangers would come in whatever game I jumped into.

Darkness consumed me as I was completely absorbed by my monitor and I knew.

This was the beginning of the adventure of my life.

That once in a lifetime chance to have that adventure that would change my life, had appeared.

* * *

**AN: Ahh, I think I made Akyris more human like this time since he took the explanation in the last chapter pretty well. Any tips/advice/reviews are always appreciated. Thank you for reading!**


	3. Incident 1: Imperishable Night Part 1

**AN: I took a really long time to finish this. Honestly though, I hecka BS'ed some parts because I hit a small writer's block halfway through. **

**It's not ****hard to find. Enjoy!**

* * *

_**Chapter 3: Imperishable Night; Part 1**_

**The Gap**

My vision was completely black. It was so dark, I couldn't even see my hands in front of me even though they were only 1 or 2 feet away from me.

I felt myself falling into an unknown area with my stomach feeling very strange.

I felt the sudden urge to close my eyes and go to sleep, but I struggled against that urge as long as I could.

I was very curious to see what would happen as being I would assimilate into a female was one thing, experiencing it was completely a different story.

My curiosity alone however, was not enough to keep my eyes open.

My strength was slowly being sapped by a force I knew not, while at the same time, my mind was also slowly losing its will to stay awake, and I slowly succumbed into the seemingly everlasting darkness.

...

**Gensokyo: Hakurei Shrine**

...

I felt my mind slowly reactivating itself and I slowly regained my ability to think.

Is it over? I thought, slightly drowsy from my previous bout of forced sleep during the transfer from my world to a Gensokyo world where an incident would soon occur. Which one would occur, I had no idea. After all, I never played the other games before besides Imperishable Night which I still failed terribly at.

Was that my sense of touch returning?

Hey! I can feel my senses coming back to me! I excitedly thought, happy that I would finally be able to see and feel again.

Something was in my hand. Something long. The surface of it was smooth and slightly fragile because of its somewhat small size.

I opened my eyes, feeling a slight tinge of pain on it for trying to force my eyes open too fast.

A flash of white blinded me for a second before my eyes adjusted themselves to the sun's energy, finally giving my eyesight back.

As my eyes finally had its chance to some sunlight to it, I took a look at my surroundings. Trees surrounded my area to the left and right side of me while a torii gate was in place in front of me.

Behind me, a slightly run down shrine was in place with a donation box in front of it.

Also, I was holding a broom. No wonder it was small and fragile.

Wait. A shrine? I thought, slowly getting scared of what would happen if I looked at myself.

Curiosity decided to bite me in the butt as I looked down to see myself not wearing my normal clothes I had wore when I went to sleep.

My clothes had completely changed from mine to those of a shrine maiden.

My sneakers were replaced by black shoes with white socks and my legs looked incredibly skinny rather than my fatter legs that I orginally had.

My jeans were replaced with a red skirt while my arms which was much skinner than my previous male arms, had sleeves. Or rather, they were sleeves that weren't attached to my...shirt.

Oh wait, its attached to the skirt area. Never mind then. A yellow handkerchief was around my neck, tied in a neat fashion.

I touched my hair with my hand while running through it to see how long it was. It didn't seem very long at all. At best, it only extended to my shoulers. There was also a somewhat long ribbon in my hair and 2 little hair straps attached to the locks of hair next to my face.

I slowly gathered my breath to...

"WHAT THE HELL IS THIS!" I screamed as loud as I could into the air with a feminine voice, to release my pent up stress of actually taking this person's place to solve the incident.

I panted heavily and the fact that I had a female voice finally clicked into my mind. This absolutely, did not feel right at all. I had taken the place of Reimu, the legendary shrine maiden of paradise.

And do I dare look to see how big my breasts were?

...

I guess one look wouldn't hurt. I thought to myself while slowly pushing my shirt/skirt combo forward to see how big it was.

I let go instantly and a bright tinge of red covered my face at what I saw.

Moving along.

This was Gensokyo? The world I kept trying to deny that existed? The world in which the touhou game series took place in? The world that my body felt did exist even if my mind thought differently?

Gensokyo. It gave me a rather, easy feeling. Like everything was going to be ok.

For a game setting, this seems all the more too realistic to just be a mere game setting.

Hmm? What was that in the sky?

A speck of black was quickly approaching the shrine.

It's a girl coming closer, and it looks like she's riding a broom.

She's sure going really fast through the air.

It didn't take long for her to finally enter the shrine's perimeter area.

"Reimuuuuu ze~!" She yells out as she descends onto the shrine grounds.

Wait, I'm not- I said to her and stopped midway as it clicked into my mind that I was Reimu and no longer even looked like a male.

Shoot, I forgot.

"You're not what Reimu?" The girl asked me as she landed, though my mind didn't focus on her question.

It wandered off to the girl in front of me instead.

The girl who landed. Another character I think whom I may have taken the place of as I remember her being a possibility to go out to solve incidents.

She wore a black magician's hat with a white ribbon attached to it. Her hair was a golden blonde with a braid on one side of her golden locks. A red ribbon was attached onto her braid as well. She wore a white apron over her black attire. On her upper chest area (Cough), was more clothes with just black and white. She was also gripping a broom that looked like it was far superior than the one I was holding.

This was Marisa Kirisame. The self-proclaimed ordinary magician whom I had trouble defeating when I was at home playing Imperishable Night.

I remember her mostly because of her use of the 'Master Spark.' That giant laser which she called a 'Love Sign' completely surprised me and killed me during my first attempt to defeat her. It only reminded me of one thing.

**I'MA FIRING MAH LAZOR!**

Ah-hem. Enough of that though. Looks like Marisa was trying to get my attention.

"Uhh Reimu? Gensokyo to Reimuuu! Marisa said, trying to get my attention by waving her broom in front of me.

"Huh? What?" I pretended to miss her chat and acted confused.

"I heard your scream all the way from the Forest of Magic, so I came over here as fast as I could ze!" Marisa explained her reason for rushing over here on her magic broom.

"And you thought I was in automatically in trouble because of that?" I asked, trying to think of how Reimu would have acted in this situation.

"Well, yeah. I mean, what if some new youkai suddenly kidnapped you and kept you imprisoned ze?" Marisa asked rather dumbly and scratched her head.

That's...

actually very possible.

I have almost no idea what Reimu can do or use.

The only thing I can think of for her is Ying-Yang orbs, ofudas, and charms.

I better find out what her attacks are soon, otherwise theres no way I'll win any fights. I thought grimly to myself.

But for now, I'll just enjoy what Gensokyo can offer before the incident I have to take on shows up.

"So, what are you going to do for the Harvest Moon Festival Reimu?" Marisa asked me while I swept leaves off the stone road leading to the shrine.

Harvest Moon Festival?

Oh yeah!

On the eve of the Harvest Moon Festival, the actual moon is supposed to be taken and replaced by a fake one!

That would be tomorrow!

This is Imperishable Night!

How lucky! The first incident I get is the one I'm most familiar with!

But first, Marisa's question.

"Well, I guess I'm just going to make food for it. You and alot of other youkais always end up showing up at my shrine to party after any important event." I answered with a sigh, remembering that sometimes, many youkais would gather up at Reimu's shrine to party, and continued sweeping leaves off the stone road.

"Well, I'll just ask everyone to come over and party at your shrine then ze!" Marisa said, happy that there would be another get together and party at my shrine.

Screw you!

"Oh! That reminds me! I have something to show you!" Marisa exclaimed excitedly, and put her hand into her big witch hat, most likely trying to grab something.

She seemed like the straightforward type of person so it had to be something great.

I stopped my sweeping, turned my gaze towards her and watched her arm move around until finally, it stopped and her face changed to an excited one.

*Insert Drumroll here.

Sounds like it's going to be something awe-inspiring!

And its...

It's a...

!

...?

A mushroom?

The object which you seemed so excited about was a mushroom?

I guess even the straightforward people can have their surprises, even if they don't mean it.

Unless this was one of those kind of mushrooms where it gave you an extra life or maybe made you bigger, there was no way this mushroom was gonna be that impressive.

"Marisa, thats just another mushroom." I plainly stated, staring at the mushroom like it was a foreign object.

"But this one is a new one Reimu! See? This one is purple, not red like the other one's I showed you ze!" Marisa told me while shoving the mushroom about 3.4 inches away from my face, trying vainly to persuade me that the mushroom was awesome.

"Marisa, you don't even know what this mushroom does." I argued, hoping that she would give up on impressing me with it.

Also, where the hell did you get it? This mushroom bears a striking similar resemblance to the one's from the Mario games!

"That's why, we should eat it and see what it does! I'm sure it won't be that bad!" Marisa suggested, moving it even closer to my face.

No, I'm sorry, but it's got poison written all over it.

Doesn't the purple color tell you that? And is that mold I see?

"It's probably poisonous." I commented, trying to prevent myself from getting forced to eat it.

"It's not poisoned, it's just got a funny color on it, thats all ze!" Marisa replied, pointing towards the white spots on the mushrooms along with a big black mark on it.

All right, thats it! I give up!

Plan B!

I sigh to her and stick my hand out with my palm open say, "Fine, give me one. I'll try one with you."

"Oh, Ok!" Marisa said with a tone of excitement that I would finally try it.

She shoved the purple shroom forcefully into my hands and reached into her hat to grab another one.

I stared at the plant for a couple of seconds, making me feel slightly sick from just the sight of it in front of me.

As Marisa turned around however, I turned the opposite direction with my back facing her, slowly put my broom down against the stone floor, and positioned myself in a baseball pitching stance.

I looked back quickly to check if Marisa was still busy grabbing another mushroom which she was.

I pulled my arm back, lifted my front leg up to gain power and catapulted the mushroom as far as I could toward the area below.

I quickly grabbed my broom and turned back to Marisa to see that she stopped moving her arm around in her hat.

She pulled out, yet another purple mushroom excitedly though to my dismay, and ate it.

CRUNCH, CRUNCH.

Suddenly, Marisa froze up, dropped the plant she was eating and turned around to face me.

"OMGWTFBBQ!" I was mind screwed as I looked at Marisa while my mouth involuntarily dropped down to form an O.

A blue look filled Marisa's face and sickly white eyes replaced her brown eyes and she fainted onto my chest.

"Hey! What's wrong Marisa? Get up!" I panicked as I dropped my broom and tried shaking her back to life.

It didn't work and I continued to panic until I finally decided to take her inside the shrine to have her rest.

God damn it! This is why you don't eat unidentified plants or whatever! I thought, mentally scolding her for deciding to eat it.

I put her arm around my shoulder and slowly dragged her inside the shrine.

I set her down against the wooden floor and quickly searched the shrine's rooms for anything I could use.

Aha! A roll up bed! I'll use that to make her comfortable! I thought as I pulled it out of a closet I found.

I dragged it out and laid it flat next to Marisa. Then I carried Marisa, doing everything I could to avoid touching her butt, and set her down on the bed.

I pulled the covers and lifted it over her and the blue look on Marisa's face disappeared, but the anime styled ghostly white eyes were still attached on her face.

I took off her witch hat, only to feel something rather lumpy.

I peered inside, only to find about 5 more of the mushrooms Marisa just ate and the one I threw off into the distance somewhere.

Figures. I thought while taking the mushrooms out of the hat, leaving it next to Marisa as I brang them over to the kitchen so I could dump it later.

I sat next to Marisa's figure for a while until I started to get bored and impatient.

If I remember right, Reimu usually served tea. I'll go grab myself one of them.

I stood up and went to go make myself some tea, leaving Marisa alone with her white eyes.

...

"Where does she even leave all her things I wonder." I mutter to myself, looking in what I thought was the kitchen area.

Ahh here it is. Some herbs for tea. She must be a natural tea maker then, or just used to serving it whenever guests came over.

...

Done! I looked at my hot tea, rather inspired atmy own work. I poured it into a couple stone cups, put it onto a circle tray, and brought it over to where Marisa was, and set it down next to her.

She still looked like she was or completely freaked out by a person or an object.

Well, I'm sure shes going to be okay. Her eyes were starting to replace the big white plates that she received after she took a bite out of that poisoned plant.

Crap, now that I think about it, I forgot to take off my shoes before going in.

I took off my shoes, placed them at the entrance of the shrine, and sat down next to Marisa.

I grabbed a tea cup gazed out into the afternoon sun, watching orange leaves replace the ones I had recently swept up.

It is, rather peaceful isn't it? There were almost no sounds except for the wind whispering to the leaves to fall.

It almost makes me doubt that any trouble could happen here.

I took small sips from my tea cup, careful not to take longer one's for fear of burning my tongue.

This is really good. I knew I was used to making tea back at home, but I don't think I've ever made one this good.

I lost my sense of time as I continued to watch over the land of Gensokyo. There was a mountain that I could see over at the far side. Other than that, I mostly kept my gaze at the trees losing their orange and red leaves. It reminded me a little bit of my life. It was always descending into the deep pits of trouble. Then usually, I got out of the trouble which resembles spring in a way since spring has the leaves come back to the trees.

I sigh to myself, questioning if my life would stay that way forever. Falling and coming back up only to fall again.

*Shuffle Shuffle

And it looks like Marisa is just getting back up to disturb my peace time.

"Ughhhh, what happened ze?" Marisa groaned as she slowly got up from her laying position into a sitting position.

"You ate that mushroom and ended up fainting because of it." I answered, turning my gaze back at Marisa.

"Oh yeah! Ehehehehe." Marisa giggled and just scratched her head in embarassment.

"Is that really something to be proud of Marisa?" I questioned with a slightly annoyed look.

She didn't answer and just rubbed her head with her eyes closed with her face facing toward me.

She got up, walked toward me, and sat next to me in a casual position.

She took a tea cup and sipped it a little before suddenly stopping and put it on the wooden board.

I looked at her in confusion at why she would break her action like that.

"Whoa. Reimu, when did you get better at making tea? It suddenly tastes better than the other one's I drank with you!" Marisa said to me, complimenting me in a strange way, though I'll took it graciously.

I honestly don't know. I feel like I'm missing something here though.

"Well, thanks!" I accepted the compliment.

We slowly drink our tea in silence as we watched the afternoon sun slowly descend to become a sunset.

"Oh yeah! If I fainted to the mushroom, how come you didn't faint like I did?" Marisa asked me as she remembered that I had taken a mushroom from her.

"Oh that? I still have it. I just didn't eat it because I wanted to see what would happen if it was eaten." I lied, though I felt very guilty for lying Reimu's friend.

"Ahh, well. If it does that kind of effect, maybe it would help with my research of making a magic spell that cleans up for me!" Marisa exclaimed, looking proud of her discovery of a possible new spell.

And that is a sign of a clutterbug. I wonder what Marisa's house looks like.

"Well, I better get going ze! Places to go and things to be done!" Marisa said to me in an excited tone, though I was starting to think that tone was her usual way of talking.

Marisa got up, left her finished tea cup onto the tray and went outside to pick up her broom.

"Farewell Marisa." I said as I waved good-bye to her while sitting down.

"See ya later Reimu~!" Marisa yelled out as she got onto her broom and flew off into the evening sky.

Well, I can't say that my encounter with Marisa was all bad.

I learned that the game I was in was Imperishable Night, which I was pretty familiar with because I repeated the stages over and over as, I got game over all the time.

Marisa seemed like she was pretty straightforward in most cases if not naive at times.

She also gets excited over things I don't think any normal person would. Unfortunately, her actions and personality just screams for trouble. God, she's troublesome. She got herself poisoned by a purple mushroom.

I guess I could always make some actual friends in Gensokyo like with Marisa.

She looks pretty nice and even if she presented me with a poison mushroom, she wanted to share it with me.

It would be nice to make friends in here.

Unfortunately, as this scenario will progress, I will have to fight Marisa to get through this.

I'm even at a disadvantage.

She's got experience fighting while I have nothing.

She can even fly with her broom and I can't fly at all.

I sighed with deep stress plaguing my mind. This entire incident was no doubt, going to be a long an perilous journey through them all.

I got up and started putting away the things I had to set up for Marisa.

I put the tray and the tea cups away, and put the roll up bed back into the closet.

As soon as I was done, I went back out to the doorsteps to the shrine and just continued staring out into the sky as the sun continued to set with the moon taking its place in the sky.

Soon, fireflies filled the skies bringing about a marvelous night. They were like orange lights in the night sky, joining along with the white stars.

It even calmed down my piled up stress of thinking about all the incidents.

This is...

Definitely a sight to behold.

It was beautiful and awe-inspring at the same time.

Words could not express the feelings I felt while I watched the fireflies dance with the stars.

There was nothing like this in the real world.

"Wow..." I muttered to myself, continuing to watch them and the beautiful scenery.

"Now I can honestly believe why Maribel and Renko want to come over to Gensokyo." I admitted, giving them my silent apologies over my doubts of why they would want to enter a world where incidents seemed to pop up left and right.

This sight was almost non existant in our world. I guess assimilating as Reimu to be able to watch this wasn't so bad after all.

As much as I would have loved to continue watching, my body or Reimu's body needs flared up for me to rest up.

I sighed disappointed that I would not be able to continue watching.

However, the incident would start tomorrow so I needed to be fully rested to hopefully and finally get revenge and beat the crap out of Eirin.

I got up from the doorstep, closed the door leading in and went back into Reimu's sleeping quarters which only consisted of a futon and a blanket, laid on it, and felt the comfortable version of sleep entering me.

This is so much better than when I fell down the gap and got forced to sleep. I thought one last time before sleep took over my mind.

The next day...

Slowly, my mind turned itself back on and I could think once again.

Was it morning? My mind questioned itself and asked my body to get up.

And so I did.

First with my eyes, then with my body, then getting with my legs standing up.

I was still in Reimu's bedroom.

I'll say one thing first though.

Sleeping in a female body sure feels alot better than my own.

My mind had never felt so much at ease.

I was full of energy, ready to do anything unlike my own where it took at least an hour or two for it get up.

And even then, I usually only had half the energy.

Hmm. I wore the same clothes as I slept and when I conversed with Marisa.

I should go check out her other clothes.

Ahh a basket with clothes. That has to be it.

Let's see here...

Shrine Maiden clothes,

More Shrine Maiden clothes

Even more Shrine Maiden clothes...

...

REIMU! ARE YOU KIDDING ME! THESE ARE ALL THE SAME CLOTHES! I sceamed as loud as I could.

The shrine shook from my raging voice and birds chirping flew off in random directions.

I slowly calmed down by taking deep breaths and took one of the shrine maiden outfits to change into.

I guess I should have expected it as Reimu WAS a shrine maiden, but what the hell.

Seriously.

I was scared. This was undressing a girl. Serious business calls for serious solutions.

First, I took off the detached sleeves, intending to replace them with the new one's I had grabbed.

Then I untied the yellow handkerchief, but I kept the ribbon on my head as I did not want to tie it again in my hair.

I pulled off the red dress or whatever it was off quickly and changed into the new one rather quickly so as to not think perverted thoughts while looking at Reimu's body.

I took another set of detached sleeves and put them onto my arm. I retied the yellow handkerchief around my neck having slight difficulty however. Lastly, I changed my socks into a new pair. My feet released a breath of relief as I put on the new socks.

That...

Was my most traumatizing experience ever. I am scarred for life.

Changing as a girl. I don't think anything back home can ever beat this experience.

I really hope my future incident solving doesn't involve me changing another girl again.

Actually, I take that back. I don't think I want to bath as a girl.

That's just scary.

Well, time to get out and get some air.

I head over to the shrine entrance and open it by sliding it to the side and almost instantly, the cool morning air rushed against my skin as I stretched my arms out to release some tension inside of it.

The sun was still rising though the sight of it was amazing. It's radiance filled the land below with a bright glow. It must be around 6 or 6 thirty in the morning about now.

So what should I do while I wait until I travel with Yukari to go to find whoever's responsible for the fake moon?

Option number one.

I could always travel around and see the world of Gensokyo, but I can't defend myself against any attackers so I can't do that.

Option number two.

I could always stay at the shrine and wait for night time. That's boring though. I don't even know how Reimu manages not to stay bored when theres no incidents around.

Option number three.

I find out how to work Reimu's abilities to make it through this world. That sounds best though I hope no one finds me.

I remember her holding a stick weapon in Imperishable Night. What was it called?

Oh yeah. A gohei, there we go.

I went back inside to go find the gohei.

It was leaning against the wall in Reimu's bedroom.

I grabbed it and swung it around to get used to its weight.

Even though it was pretty light, it seemed sturdy enough, and I can probably use this for melee. I thought, hoping that this wouldn't be the only thing I could do.

I went outside to the doorsteps, put on Reimu's shoes and went behind the shrine to go see what I could do against a nearby tree.

Is that a hot spring?

Oh my kami.

It is a hot spring at Reimu's shrine!

She gets to bathe in this hot spring everyday?

Talk about lucky.

**Gensokyo: Hakurei Shrine, Back**

I continued a little farther behind the shrine and stopped at a pack of autumn trees.

Ok.

So...

How the heck do I shoot?

What, do I just stick my hand out and say fire?

"Fire!" I stupidly yelled, trying to fire anything out of my hands.

Of course.

Nothing.

What do I have to do?

This is just ticking me off.

...

You know what, let's just use instincts instead.

"Ugh! Die you stupid tree!" I screamed in false anger, deciding to vent it all on the plant ahead of me.

I jump up and dive with all intent to break the tree with my bare fists.

...

Which doesn't work and ends up leaving a red mark on my hand instead.

"OW! Screw you damn tree!" I screamed and stuck my hand out with the intent to destroy it.

Small square bullets the size of an eraser formed at the center of my palm and flew toward the tree making barely noticeable burn marks on it.

...

Ok well, that sorta worked.

The bullets were weak, but I still need to find out how I did that?

"Was it my anger that made me shoot it?" I asked myself, trying to deduct what had cause the bullets to appear.

Well, I'm making slight progress.

I was able to shoot bullets, even though they were very weak and would probably do no damage to anyone.

"Ok, well let's try this again." I said to myself, holding out my arm in the direction of the same tree I hurt my hands against.

I concentrated completely on trying to blow the tree apart, and indeed, about 5 or 6 small bullets did come from it. Slightly bigger than my first attempt plus it did a more noticable damage. The wood on the tree was now chipped away and the burn marks were bigger.

Not too bad, so its the mindset that fires the bullets. With a mindset, its understandable how it's alot harder to fire off bullets.

Let's try this again!

I stuck my hand out once again, thinking intently to defeat the inanimate object known as the tree, and once again fired the same amount of bullets as my previous try with the exact same effects.

Hmm, why are my bullets so weak? I wondered, knowing that Reimu's powers were much more stronger than this.

Maybe I'm just being impatient. I probably am.

I'll probably stop here. Actual combat is the best way to gain experience.

Ok, as long I get the basis for shooting bullets, I can at least defend myself from any weaker enemies that come for me.

I pick up my dropped gohei near the tree I released my anger against and walked back to the front of the shrine.

...

Aww damn it, the leaves are back. I guess I'll just sweep them up again.

I lay my gohei against the wall of the shrine next to the door and go inside to go find the broom to go clean the stone road.

Ah, there it was, lying next to the area where I had Marisa rest.

I take the broom and just sweep away the leaves that had filled the road to the shrine again.

Now that I think about it, even though this is a shrine, I'm not really getting any visitors.

Makes me wonder how this shrine manages to stay intact when theres no donations going on with no visitors.

?

I hear footsteps coming up to the shrine.

I walk over to the stairway and look down to have a glance at the visitor.

A blonde haired girl was going up the stairs. It doesn't look Marisa.

I went back and continued sweeping, waiting for the new visitor to reach the top of the stairs.

Finally, she made it and I turned around to have a good luck at her.

"Good afternoon Reimu." She politely says and bows down with me showing me respect.

Blonde hair with a pink hairband. A blue dress with a white neck covering over it. A small doll hovering next to her, probably waiting for her master's orders. The girl held a thick book that was wrapped like a present except without the wrapping paper, though I somehow knew that it was not for me.

Alice Margatroid, the seven-colored puppeteer who was Marisa's youkai partner if you chose her to go and solve Imperishable Night's incident.

Puppeteer indeed as I would have assumed Alice was a normal girl if not for the floating doll next to her.

Lokon mentioned that she was basically the youkai version of Marisa as they were both magicians though Alice was much more level headed than Marisa.

It seems to be true since Alice seems a lot more calm and respectful than Marisa who just burst in saying hi.

The doll seems to be able to move on its own though so I guess shes not controlling it with strings.

"Good afternoon Alice." I returned the greeting with a bow of my own and continued sweeping a little bit more as Alice sat down on the wooden board in front of the doorway to the inside of the shrine.

As I finally finished getting all the leaves off the road, I walked over to Alice to converse with her.

"Would you like some tea" I asked Alice, while getting prepared to go inside.

"Very well Reimu." Alice replied, accepting my offer of tea.

I go inside into Reimu's small kitchen area to make some tea.

I do the exact same thing as I did with the tea when Marisa fell unconscious because of the poison mushroom.

I come back to Alice with a tray of two tea cups and set it next to Alice.

"Thank you." Alice thanked me as she took tea cup and took a sip.

And just like Marisa, she suddenly stopped her drinking after one sip.

She looked at me with a rather confused face too.

"Is this a new tea recipe Reimu? The tea tastes much better than the previous ones I have had when I last visited you." Alice questioned and complimented me at the same time.

Why am I not surprised at your answer?

Oh well, I'm not going to complain about your compliment. I'll take it graciously to satisfy my pride.

"I have changed it a little. I added a couple more herbs to it." I lied once again about the tea.

Another lie about the tea. I should think of better lies for it if I ever take Reimu's spot again.

"I see. What do you think about Marisa Reimu?" She asked me, with her formal voice.

"Marisa? Well, how should I put it?" I answered trying to think of a way to describe her without using what Lokon told me.

"She is cheerful mostly and is naive at times. She's probably a clutterbug and does things that a normal person wouldn't even consider doing like using mushrooms to experiment with. She seems like a troublesome person." I put in, thanking myself of how I threw away that dreaded mushroom.

"I see." Alice replies rather slightly annoyed.

You don't like her too much do you?

"Well what do you think about her?" I ask the same question to Alice.

"What do I think about her?" Alice asks me though I know she heard me.

She thinks for a moment before she nods her head and concludes with her answer.

"I think that she is an idiot and very annoying to say the least." She answered to me rather bluntly.

Ouch. Summed up in just one sentence and 2 main words. What, do these 2 live next to each other or something?

I wonder if Marisa would even feel offended from Alice's insult.

We both drink our tea quietly, mostly because I wasn't able to get any conversations or topics going.

When I get back, I should research the touhou cast.

She left moments after she finished the tea after I bid her good bye.

And now, I have nothing to do again.

The leaves just came back onto the stone road, but I don't feel like sweeping it away this time.

Well, since its the Harvest Moon Festival eve, I'll make some dango for it.

I remember Mom doing it a couple of times and showing me how to do it so why not?

Marisa said she would invite people to come over to the shrine for a party so...

I'll just make as much as I can!

Now lets see, I wonder if Reimu has any soy flour...

...

Timeskip

...

Phew!

Ok, I think I have enough! 30 skewers of Kinako dango should be enough for everyone if Marisa actually brings people over.

It took a long time, but I'm sure everyone will enjoy it. Plus my cooking skills should get better!

I wonder, is it night time yet?

I head outside to see that it is indeed night time.

?

What is that?

Theres a purple hole with eyes in it over next to the torii gate.

Theres 2 ribbons on the ends of it too.

I slowly walk toward the purple hole coming close to it and to my surprise...

"Hello!"

GAH!

W-What the heck?

I tripped over myself because of the surprise pop up this woman made.

You just popped up out of that purple hole!

The woman slowly climbs out of the purple hole, and it just closes like a one way trip.

She looked to be around the age of 20, maybe 30.

A mop hat covered the top of her head with overflowing golden locks of hair going down. Her long, and I mean long white dress went down to the top of her feet and there was a purple layer of clothing on the front side of the white dress with many diagrams on it.

Yukari Yakumo, the boundary youkai who led a laid-back life sleeing during the day, leaving Ran to do all the chores around her house. I play as Yukari pretty often because in Imperishable Night, I need to focus, switching Reimu with Yukari and makes me move slower though it helps with grazing and dodging the bullets.

If she's here though, that must mean that it's time to go.

I get back up and ask, "What are you doing here Yukari?"

"Oh? I'm going to go out and see what's wrong with the moon. Would you like to come?" Yukari said.

"Actually, I was just about to go out to go find out what's wrong with the moon." I said to Yukari, using my prior knowledge of the moon being replaced with a fake one.

"Well, I will be joining along with your trip after all!" Yukari said rather excited for some reason.

You sound really happy to come along with me. Any reason why?

"However, the Harvest Moon Festival is tomorrow and we can't have it go on with a fake moon in the sky. We'll need to stop time for a while until we get the real moon back." Yukari explained to me, and waited for my answer.

"Sure!" I agreed rather quickly, though even if I said no, she probably would have had her way anyway.

"Very well then, just give me a moment." Yukari said, and raised her hands to her sides.

So the heroines froze the night to solve the incident before the Harvest Moon Festival.

That makes sense.

It looks like Yukari is doing her thing because the edge of the sky starts trembling a little.

She puts her hand down and sighs before smiling at me.

"Ok, it's done. The night is frozen for now." Yukari said to me, and turned around facing toward the land.

No wonder this game was called Imperishable Night.

The night was frozen all along while the events of the game were going on.

Now I understand, why ZUN called it this.

Genius man. Just pure genius material.

"Well then, let us go out and find who replaced the real moon with a fake one yes?" Yukari told me, as she turned around to me and gave me a devious smile.

I only nodded to her question and asked her to give me a moment so I could go get my gohei inside the shrine.

I come back out with it, and went down the stairs leading to the rest of the area Gensokyo had to offer.

Doubts and fears filled and clouded my mind on the way down.

Even if I knew which enemy was coming, I would have to rely an Yukari alot.

But it doesn't seem like she cares a whole lot.

Yukari was suppose to be Reimu's friend though.

That meant that she knew Reimu's powers in and out.

Just what would she do if she figured out that I wasn't actually the real Reimu since I can't use any of her powers.

No, she's too smart for that. Lokon even said that she was incredibly good at setting up scenarios making her a very good manipulator.

She's going to notice me.

It might be for the best, then she wouldn't think any less of Reimu getting weaker.

God, thinking this much about the consequences is making me think that this world still seems too damn real to be fictional.

I know that it might be because I'm integrated with the character in the game but even so, who wouldn't think that this was real after being here for a while.

Maybe Renko and Maribel was right after all?

Yukari flew overhead above me as I continued walking down the long stairs.

I kind of envy her.

I don't know how to even fly yet.

The only thing I can do is shoot puny bullets out of my hand that's barely enough to hurt someone.

I don't know any spell cards that Reimu has and I can't research that on the computer now.

Supposedly, Yukari was theoretically able to destroy Gensokyo completely with the border surrounding it.

Reimu is supposed to be able to stand toe to toe with her in a fight with her amazing holy powers, not shoot weak-ass bullets that would probably just annoy someone.

Not knowing any spell cards is gonna hurt.

At least I have my faithful gohei to whack someone senseless if all else fails.

...

**Gensokyo: Road to human village**

...

I didn't even notice I was walking toward human village.

We've been walking for a while. Or rather, it felt like it.

It's pretty quiet around here, though I'd rather not say it since I might jinx it or something.

Yukari is still flying overhead me casually like a slow tour.

Is she just following me? I thought questioningly to myself, occasionally glancing back at her.

Hmm?

What's this feeling I'm getting?

Like there's something wrong.

My body is telling me to get out of the way.

But I don't see anything though.

RUSTLE RUSTLE!

!

Something came from the bushes!

I know I heard some leaves getting moved.

BULLETS! FROM THE BUSHES!

Damn! I can't react fast enough to dodge!

I raise my arms instinctually, preparing myself to brace for it and the bullets collide against my arm.

"Nggh!" I grunt in pain as the bullets bruise and burn my arm.

These...

These actually hurt...

This...

This can't be a game if the pain is real!

The bullets finally stopped...

All right that's it!

Whoever's there is going to get it now!

Ignoring all pain on my arm, I raise my arm in anger, and throw my gohei wth all my strength in the direction of the bullets.

It goes into bushes...

SMACK!

I hear the gohei hit something and it flies off, landing next to my feet.

"Ow!" I heard someone yell.

Bullseye! That feels so much better. I thought, indulging myself over my small victory of revenge for shooting me.

The person I threw my gohei at slowly flew over the bush giving me view of their hair.

As she slowly rose, I could see the antenna on her teal hair. Her hands were rubbing against it, most likely because I hit her with my angrily thrown stick. A black cape dawned her with a white shirt. Her pants were slightly darker with a hue of blue. Purpleish shoes and white socks filled her feet.

Oh. It's Imperishable Night's first stage boss. Wriggle Nightbug.

"What'd you do that for!" I heard Wriggle yell at me about the thrown gohei.

"Hey! You shot me first! That means war!" I argued, picking up my gohei, making sure my reflexes wouldn't fail me this time.

"Ooo, this is rather interesting!" Yukari commented, reaching into thin air to open a gap.

She puts it in and pulls it out after about 4 seconds, having popcorn in her hands.

Oh, so your going watch us fight while eating movie food?

Damn you Yukari! My life is on the line and your not gonna help? How does Reimu even deal with this?

"I'm going to eat you...you...you red-white girl!" Wriggle screamed at me, practically yelling 'I'm going to kill you!' to me.

I'M MALE! Don't you people...

Oh, oops. I really need to stop forgetting.

Meanwhile, Wriggle is glaring daggers at me, making me feel uncomfortable and pressured at the same time.

"There is no way, I'm going to lose to a first stage boss!" I thought, slightly doubting myself if I could win or not.

Absolutely no way.

* * *

**AN: So whatcha think? R&Rs are always nice. Like I said, I BS'ed parts of this chapter. Fight scene coming up! My first one so I hope it **

**doesn't look ****too bad! Thank you for reading!**


	4. Incident 1: Imperishable Night Part 2

**AN: This took me a long time to write. Thinking of all of this never stressed me out so bad. Well, here's where we left off. Enjoy!**

**

* * *

**

**Chapter 4: First fight of the New Reimu**

**Gensokyo: Pathway to the Human Village**

GAHH!

WHAT AM I DOING?

Oh yeah, I'm running away from Wriggle since she's firing light green bullets toward me which shower onto the ground.

"FOR A FIRST STAGE BOSS, THIS BUG IS KILLING ME!" I accidentally screamed, immediately regretting it as Wriggle fired even more bullets.

_Turn left! Turn left!_ My body screamed at me, which I did, narrowly evading the bullets as they landed on the ground.

"I'M NOT A BUG! I'M A FIREFLY! JUST FOR THAT, YOU GET TO EAT THIS!" Wriggle screamed back, an stopped firing for a moment.

I stopped running and turned around to see Wriggle floating 15 feet above the ground.

**"{Lamp Sign "Firefly Phenomenon"}" **Activated Wriggle as she let loose 4 bugs.

Almost instantly after being summoned, the bugs each fired circle shaped bullets that were fairly easy to dodge though. However, Wriggle herself started firing a pinwheel shaped pattern of bullets that slowly stopped and launched themselves at me.

Hey wait a second, why am I running away?

She doesn't look like she can move while shooting.

And If I keep running, I'll never be able to defeat her and move on.

I need to learn how to graze and dodge bullets.

This is the perfect time to do it, though also the worst time possible.

This is so risky, but the gains I could get from it are very good too.

At first, I start fumbling with my steps, getting burned with a couple of bullets either from the bugs, or Wriggle's shots herselves.

My legs started to sting from being forced to move so much and my arms were slightly charred from the first shot Wriggle initially gave me and the bullets I just got hit with.

I watched intently, at the bullets, looking for any sign of weakness to dodge it.

Luckily, the bullets are very scattered making large areas to enter to evade bullets. The bugs only fired straight toward me when I stood still so all I had to do was slightly move my body in any direction except toward it.

But I still can't hit her! She's too high! If I don't do anything, she'll keep firing until I get too tired.

I'm not used to fighting, so I gotta end her spell card somehow.

Ok, let's try this plan.

"Hey you bug! Your attack stinks! You better get me or I'll call you 'bugger' for the rest of your life!" I taunted, trying to make her come closer to me.

"Why you! I'm going to get you for that!" Wriggle said as she flew slightly lower and fired more bullets at a faster pace.

I barely had time to think as I continued to dodge the bullets at a faster pace as well.

I can't afford to get hit. Every hit counts! I thought, slowly getting used to the pace I was dodging at.

10 feet.

I don't know if I can jump that high. I need a boost to get more distance.

I better think of something too. It looks like she's starting to get ticked off because I'm dodging all her bullets now.

...

Ok, I got it!

I don't know if this will work, but if I don't do something, I'll get too tired for any future fights or even lose this one!

I stop dodging and start running toward Wriggle directly.

Left!

Right!

Slow down!

The bugs started shooting faster and I kept moving left and right in order to evade getting any more hits while continuing to run toward Wriggle.

_"Jump now!" _Something said to me which I obeyed and jumped as high as I could.

Bullets started raining onto me, though I ignored all the bullets hitting me and threw my gohei a second time as hard as I could toward her.

The gohei dissipated any oncoming bullets and just kept spinning furiously toward Wriggle.

SMACK!

...

Ouch...

I could actually hear that. Right on the face too. That might leave a mark. I almost feel sorry for Wriggle as she starts falling down.

Almost though.

Well there goes my only weapon. I thought as my savior weapon flew off into the distance.

Wriggle's falling down! I gotta reach her so I can give her a piece of my mind!

I sprinted as fast as I could to reach Wriggle and got there just in time as Wriggle was starting to pick herself up off the ground to start my melee combo.

Left punch in the stomach!

Right Kick on the knees!

Right punch on the face!

And now for the great finish for the combo!

Left uppercut on the chin!

Great memories of doing that back on the NES. (Guess what game?)

Surprisingly, hitting her didn't hurt myself at all as I would have expected some pain for hitting her.

Man that felt so satisfying. I don't think I'll ever be able to hit another girl like this again.

I broke the sacred rule of not being able to hit girls because I was a guy.

I land on my feet, waiting for Wriggle to get back up.

Let's try that again!

Right pun-

Or not. Wriggle just jumped back from my attempted punch and flew back into the air, this time a good distance away from me and higher into the air.

Bruises were on Wriggle's face. I'd be surprised if there weren't any after a good melee combo like that.

"That's it! Take this!" Wriggle stuck her arm out at me and called out something new.

**"{Wriggle Sign "Little Bug Storm"}"** Wriggle activated and fired yet another pin wheeled pattern.

However, the bullets she had fired off did no come after me immediately.

Instead, they formed a circle around Wriggle and then launched themselves toward me.

It seemed that the bullets converged together to make a smaller gap.

Wait for the first bullet to come!

Hang on!

It's almost here!

Ok now!

I pushed off my right leg dodging the first set of bullets, however, I did not see the 2nd wave behind the first one.

"Augh!" I screamed as the second set of bullets stung against my body and legs.

The pressure that my legs had piled up from moving around so fast finally decided to come out and force my legs to falling down.

I leaned on one knee, gasping for air while watching Wriggle prepare to fire another set of bullets.

This time, she was way too high for me to melee her.

I gotta think of something else.

My throwable weapon disappeared somewhere after I smacked Wriggle with it cancelling her spell card.

My fists would never be able to reach Wriggle now that she was too high to reach.

I guess I'll have to try firing off bullets then.

I'll try that the next time she stops to charge up and fire.

Here comes the next round!

Here we go.

Wait for the first wave...

Not yet...

Ok dodge!

I twisted my foot and pushed off my right leg to propel myself to the left.

Second wave incoming fast!

I kneeled down slightly and jumped back using both legs and watched as the second wave of bullets miss me.

Phew. I can dodge her spell card now.

No time though.

I stuck my arm out and used my other arm to support it.

I felt a slight surge of energy going through my arm and small bullets launched out of my hands toward Wriggle.

However...

It disappeared not even halfway through to reach Wriggle.

That is not good.

I don't even think those bullets compare to the size of Wriggle's.

"Ha ha ha! What was that?" Wriggle taunted me again while launching this time, a 3rd set of bullets.

It's Ok.

I can still dodge the bullets at least!

Wait for it...

Now!

I twist my foot again and propell myself forward to dodge the 1st wave of bullets and quickly pushed myself back to dodge the 2nd wave of bullets.

As I was about to push myself back again to dodge the 3rd wave of bullets, a sharp pain filled my leg and I couldn't follow through with my movement, making me fall unable to dodge the 3rd wave.

"GAGH!" I scream in pain again as burns overwhelm my body and I fell down onto my knees.

...

What was that?

Why did my leg just suddenly break out in pain like that?

Even now, it's still stinging with so much pain.

Like a thousand bees just stung the same spot on my leg at the same time.

"Ah ha! Now I've got you. You didn't think those bullets I hit you with were normal were they?" Wriggle confidently said as she put her arms down, ceasing momentarily.

They weren't?

But no matter how you look at it, they looked like normal bullets to me.

"The bullets I hit you with were actually insects. Instead of causing normal pain like normal bullets, they cause a more massive one later after they hit you! They actualy stunk you!" Wriggle explained to me with a rather evil tone.

Insects?

Damn! That would explain the leg pain.

But that doesn't explain the pain I still got when I got hit by the insects.

"And now to finish you off. I'll be sure to eat you until the only thing left of you is bones! This is what you get for insulting insects!" Wriggle said, preparing to launch another spell card.

**"{Hidden Bug "Hermit of an Endless Night"}** She activated, shooting her last spell card at me.

Crap! I've never seen this spell card before!

"Come on! Move!" I told myself forcefully, trying to get up and hopefully luckily dodge the next wave of oncoming bullets.

But my leg just kept refusing to move with it's intense pain.

I sigh tiredly to myself, knowing that without my legs moving, resisting was futile now.

If I can't move, I guess this is it.

My body just decided to give up and my head dropped, turning my sad look towards the singhed ground.

This sucks.

I'm gonna die within the 2nd day of being here.

I failed...

It's over.

_"It's not over! We still have a chance!"_ I felt a voice telling me.

My head just rose back up and pondered over what it just said.

A chance?

What are you talking about?

_"Spell card! Use a spell card!" _It told me, before shutting up completely.

A spell card?

What am I supposed to use?

I don't know any!

If I did, I would have used it earlier!

?

I feel...

something in my hands.

It's almost like a sign.

Should I focus all my energy to it then?

If it's a chance to win, I'll take it!

I have nothing to lose now! Except my life if this doesn't work.

I focus all my energy into the palm of my hand and watch a bright blue-white circle start forming.

Shoot! The bullets are coming closer!

I pump energy into it even faster and it forms faster, but not fast enough for comfort.

Come on!

The bullets are starting to home in on me now!

Faster!

...

OK!

It's done!

Now what do I do?

Suddenly, something filled my mind.

Something divine.

All my panic and fear just disappeared.

Time just seemed to slow down for me.

My body completely ignored all the pain that it had piled up.

It was just gone.

My body stood back up on its own still holding the blue-white orb.

My head just turned over to Wriggle's attack rather than at the big blue-white circle object I was creating earlier.

My arm with the blue object I was creating, stuck out and aimed at the mass of bullets rapidly approaching me.

I don't know why, but I worded, without thinking at all, my first spell card.

**{Holy Relic "Ying-Yang Sanctifier Orb"}**

My orb launched itself toward the mass of bullets, absorbing everything in it's path.

It only grew bigger as it combined with Wriggle's bullets in its way and continued to aim toward her.

Soon, the orb was double the original size than when I had first shot it.

Wriggle's face of confidence quickly turned to my former face.

Fear.

The orb continued to speed up toward Wriggle who also got absorbed into the orb.

It suddenly stopped while the bullets that were not caught into the orb simply dissipated into thin air.

...

**BOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMM!**

**BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!**

A massive blue explosion occured in the night sky, followed by a series of smaller one's.

It didn't seem like anyone could have lived through that or stay conscious after that.

It shook the sky with intense power and I could even feel it from here.

Wriggle was nowhere to be seen at all inside the mass of explosions.

Eventually, the blue explosions stopped and I felt my eyes stare at Wriggle's falling body.

She landed on the ground and didn't move.

That was...

incredible to say the least.

Is this the power of a spell card?

One spell card. So much damage too.

It took Wriggle out in one hit.

Granted, with it combining with Wriggle's bullets, the damage was intensified.

What would have happened if it didn't work?

I feel like I won, but only because I got lucky.

I slowly walked towards Wriggle's fallen figure and stared at it.

Breathing.

She's breathing.

I didn't kill her.

Phew.

For a first stage boss, that was utterly insane.

I wonder how any touhou fan would react if they got sucked into the game like this and was able to fight touhou characters like this.

All my bruises are still there, but I can't really feel it.

The burns on the other hand, they're gone.

I don't know why, but I won't complain about it.

Clap, Clap, Clap.

I turn around to see Yukari sitting on her open gap like a seat.

"Well done, Reimu! That was certainly a good show." Yukari commented on my fight against Wriggle.

Oh gee thanks. Thank you so much for eating popcorn and watching me struggle so much against a firefly.

You bastard, Yukari.

I was going to die, couldn't you see?

Or, did you anticipate my close victory?

I guess I'll never know.

"You're not actually Reimu though, are you?" Yukari questioned me while giving me a small smile.

Oh shoot. Busted.

I got caught pretty fast.

I guess firing weak bullets and not being able to fly made Yukari find out a bit too fast.

"Uhh, what makes you think I'm not Reimu?" I asked with slight worry that she would castrate me or something like that.

She jumps down from her gap seat and walks toward me.

"Reimu for one, wouldn't struggle like that. Yukari answered, giving a complete logical answer.

Damn.

She's right.

Reimu isn't this weak to the point I almost got completely killed by Wriggle.

"I know. That if she could fly, she would have done so." Yukari added, probably speaking from prior experience.

"I fought with her personally. She isn't this weak at all." Yukari finally concluded, stopping me from continuing to walk forward.

I sigh to myself and scold myself for not being good enough.

I guess I don't have an option here.

"Yes. Unfortunately, you're right. I'm not Reimu." I admitted to Yukari who only still kept her whimsical smile.

That smile is only making me uncomfortable you know.

"So why have you taken Reimu's body?" Yukari asked me, her face turning neutral.

The obvious questions that anyone would ask. Though, Yukari has this sort of aura that just makes you shiver.

"Trust me when I say that it wasn't exactly voluntary." I answered her question, trying to keep my voice from cracking under the pressure Yukari was exerting.

"I see. However, how have you taken control of her body and why are you here?" Yukari replied, trying to learn the reason why I was even in Gensokyo in the first place.

Well, I can't tell her that all the inhabitants of Gensokyo are just part of a game series.

As real as this seems, I'm in a game and no one would take that kind of information easily or good.

I'll just leave out as much info as I can then.

Probably lie a bit too.

"There was a gap in my world that's connected to Gensokyo. I was told that I had to close it, otherwise a disaster might happen if someone happened to discover that the gap was connected to it. I was forced to enter Gensokyo through another way and assimilated as one of the inhabitants in order to find out what was wrong and be able to defend myself better. It was just luck that I happened to take Reimu's place." I semi-lied to Yukari with a complete poker face on me.

That was a big bunch of bogey for sure.

How would anyone know that the solution to fix the gap?

Maybe she'll buy it?

I should probably tell her later that when all of this is over, I'll disappear back to my world.

She seems to think for a little while before asking me another question?

"Will Reimu come back once you find out how to close it?" Yukari asked me rather suspiciously of my previous words.

"Yes, she'll come back while I will return to my world. Don't worry though, I won't spread that Gensokyo exists. It's not as if anyone would believe me without solid proof anyway." I answered, leaving out that this Gensokyo was only a game.

"Very well, I will accompany you until you disappear then. I do wonder how a gap was formed here though. I should have noticed it." Yukari finally decided, and I was only just happy that at least, Yukari would be with me throughout this journey through this Gensokyo.

Phew!

I sweated the whole time.

Talk about pressure and nervousness.

"Oh yes! I almost forgot to give this back to you! Here you go!" Yukari said, remembering something.

She opens a gap and...

My gohei!

Oh my kami, thank you Yukari!

I give her a thanking smile before continuing on the road to the human village.

As we continue walking in the direction of the human village, Yukari comes closer to me.

"As since you are not Reimu, I obviously cannot call you that. What is your name?" Yukari asked me with a light smile on her face.

Hey.

That's the first time someone's asked for my name since everyone knows me as Reimu.

I'm kinda thankful for it.

"My name is Akyris Nanoko. It's a strange name huh? I like it though." I told Yukari as I continue walking toward.

"Hmm. I have never heard of a name such like this before. It is rather strange." Yukari replied to me before going back to floating above me.

...

Don't worry about it too much. In about 5 or 6 more fights, you'll never hear of me again.

Hmm.

We've been walking here for a while now.

Mystia should show up pretty soon.

I wonder though. Will I actually die if I fail?

Actually, I don't want to think about it.

I can't help but fear that though.

And who wouldn't?

Suddenly, a series of red and blue arrow tipped bullets flew toward me from above which broke me out of my thoughts and I quickly stepped back to avoid getting hit.

Looks like someone's here.

Immediately after, Mystia flew toward me at a fast speed, and I swung my gohei down on her head instinctually, making her stagger back and fly away from me while she recovered.

"Hey hey that's not fair! I thought some tasty looking humans finally came by." Mystia complained about my retaliation to her quick attack on me.

No.

I don't think you want to eat me.

I'm not all that fleshy you know.

"So who are you guys?" Mystia asked us, hovering about 20 feet away from us.

"Well, we're not humans." Yukari answered, though the answer she gave was something I did not see coming.

"So who are you guys then? Tengus? Youkai?" Mystia asked, somewhat determined to find out who we were.

"Listen. We are in the middle of an important mission. We need to pass through quickly so let us pass or we will be forced to wound you." Yukari warned, though she maintained a devious smile throughout all of that.

"But it's been a while since I've had any fun! How about we go over to the human village and have some fun over there?" Mystia offered, though my answer was going to be plain obvious.

"No and by the way, I'm a human." I told Mystia and she looked at me rather quickly.

"Oh ok! I'll be sure to leave out parts of you after I eat you and make you blind!" Mystia exclaimed firing off green circles as her starting attack.

I take a few steps back to give myself some room to prepare to dodge.

Here they come!

The green circled bullets move fast, however, they only came in waves of one making it easy for me to simply jump left or right to dodge.

After a while, and I don't know how but, Mystia fired off 5 white orb looking figures which left a trail of green circles as well.

They proved pointless though as they moved in the same direction as the white orb did.

"Take this!" Mystia screamed out before flying a little farther away from me.

**'{Vocal Sign "Howl of the Horned Owl"}'**

Huh?

This spell card...

I've never seen or heard of this one before.

Tons of red and blue arrow tipped shaped bullets spawned from Mystia and quickly filled the area surrounding me.

This isn't good.

There's too many bullets!

No time to panic now though.

Here it comes!

1st set of red bullets. I jump left quickly.

1st set of blue bullets. I quickly twist my foot and split step toward the right side.

2nd set of red bullets. I dive through as going left and right was unavailable to me.

2nd set of blue bullets. This time, I can't move and the bullets hit my back.

"Aggh! Ow! Ow! Ow!" I screamed in pain as the blue bullets landed against me.

I use my gohei to support myself back up and prepare for Mystia's upcoming red wave of bullets.

Too many!

I jump over the bullets only to face another set of bullets with no way to move in the air.

They land against my body brutally and I fly back forcefully onto the ground.

This doesn't bode well.

I've gotten hit already and she hasn't taken any at all.

First spell card and I can't fight back.

I don't want to throw my gohei again if I can help it.

I doubt it would work anyway. It only worked against Wriggle because she didn't see it coming and I was up close with a jump boost.

But this was Mystia. She was too far away and I couldn't even come close to her without risking any of her brutal bullets hitting me again.

I still don't have any ranged attacks to fight back with so that doesn't help.

If the bullets didn't work against Wriggle, I don't think it would work against Mystia.

I have my one spell card, which is my Holy Relic "Ying-Yang Sanctifier Orb", but I want to save that as a last resort.

Wait a moment.

The method used to create the Holy relic.

It was to charge up power to create it.

Would that work for a ying-yang orb then?

The holy relic is a ying-yang orb.

So maybe, I can charge up power into my hand to create a ying-yang orb.

I don't have any other choice at this point, so let's do it.

I start focusing my power onto the palm of my hand and a sphere shape formed.

Mystia is being really merciless though and keeps on firing off bullets at me without giving me a break!

"Ow!" I screamed as I get hurt and the power that I focused into the sphere in the middle of my palm faltered, losing a bit of it's power.

Ok.

Still have a little bit of time until the next wave comes for me.

I pump energy into the orb faster than before and finally, the orb takes a solid form with the ying-yang symbol on it!

Yes!

This is it!

Now I can at least use this to fight back!

It's slightly smaller than the holy relic, but at least I was right about the method.

Finally, a ranged attack!

Reimu must have done this in an instant though to fire off so many ying-yang orbs at the same time.

Here comes the next wave!

Ying-Yang orb, do your thing!

I threw it furiously toward the bullets on their way toward me and any bullet that touched it instantly became air as it evaporated.

I started running towards Mystia while charging up for another ying-yang orb to protect myself with.

The charge for this one was slightly shorter than the last.

Throw this one, and charge up for the next.

Just as Mystia continuously launched waves of bullets toward me, I also launched ying-yang orbs to block off any of them that were going to hit me.

Ok here we go!

Ying-yang orb throw!

I grabbed the solid orb and threw it towards Mystia.

It once again, dissipated any oncoming bullets and hit Mystia square on the stomach area.

I can see the wind coming out of her and she fumbles down, losing quite a few feet in the air.

She completely stopped shooting in order to regain her breath from the thrown orb.

Oh no you don't!

You're not going to fire anymore this time.

I super jumped up as high as I could and...

grabbed onto Mystia's leg with my empty arm.

"Hey! Let go or I'm going to fall!" Mystia screamed, trying to shake me off of her futilely.

I held onto Mystia for dear life as we were slowly descending from the sky because of the extra weight.

I smack Mystia's wings with my armed hand with my gohei, making the wings slightly bent to cause us to fall down much faster.

"Gahhhhhh!" Mystia shouted as we both fell down through the air with me attached to her.

We crashed onto the dirt road, causing some dust to fly in the air.

I get back up quickly and run towards Mystia as she was starting to get back up.

Uuuuuu~! Moaned Mystia as she slowly got back up.

SMACK!

I kick Mystia with all my strength involved and the momentum gained from running to make her fly back and land on the ground again.

I run toward Mystia's fallen body and whack her repeatedly with both hands grasping my gohei, trying to do as much damage as I could before she could get up.

Suddenly, Mystia rose her arm and fired blue bullets at point blank range making me completely unable to dodge and hurting my chest section.

Mystia flew back into the air and rubbed her sorry head in pain.

"Ow! Ow! Ow! That hurt you stupid miko!" Mystia complained as she decided to shoot me with green circles yet again.

Ok.

This one is an easy dodge.

There's more but, all I have to do is stay in place and wait until the next wave comes.

"Heeey! Stop dodging!" Mystia yelled before calling out her next spell card.

**{Moth Sign "Sphingid's Wingbeats"}**

As soon as the spell card was activated, I held my gohei in a sword like fashion and awaited for whatever bullets.

?

Moths?

They're firing off purple bullets!

There's so many of them too!

The gap to move between them are too small.

I'll get burned, literally!

I'll jump then!

I jump over the purple moth bullets...

Only to see Mystia fire red circle bullets toward me, knocking the wind out of me again as it landed on my stomach and making me crash against the bottom of a tree.

"GAWK!" I grunt in pain as my back lands against the oak tree.

I felt my the cold wood against my skin in a painful way.

My back was in pain and I panted for my air back as I rose my head.

I use my gohei as a support stick and get back up against the tree with Mystia looking at me.

That attack was brutal and hurt like crazy.

How am I supposed to counter against this?

Wait, I have an idea.

I run away from the tree as Mystia destroys it with her red circle bullets.

The tree breaks and falls over narrowly missing my back as I run away from it.

Screw you and your flying capabilities Mystia!

Mercy Kami Mercy!

Hey where's Yukari!

Help me damn it!

And I have no threat to back that up, though it was probably going to be an idle threat anyway.

I turn around and face Mystia and the moths directly and prep up a ying-yang orb.

Here comes the purple bullets again!.

I never knew moths could be so annoying!

Ok.

I bend my legs and prepare to jump while focusing my energy on my own projectile.

It's almost here, and I felt my orb ready to be launched as it no longer drained my energy.

OK Jump!

I jump into the air to stay away from the moths' bullets.

And just as before, Mystia decides now to fire her own bullets towards me as I was in the air.

But I'm ready now.

Take this!

I throw the orb toward the bullets Mystia shot.

**Pssh! Pssh! Pssh!**

It breaks through at least 3 of them.

**Pssh! Boom!**

That didn't sound good.

And I was right.

My orb was gone!

And here comes the rest of the red bullets!

Gaah! Gohei block go!

I raise my gohei to defend myself against the remaining red bullets that my orb had failed to break through.

They collide against my gohei and disappear, pushing me back down to the ground, though.

Those bullets are pretty strong!

I gripped and held gohei as firm as I could and the blunt force of it still hurt my hands.

No wonder my orb decided to break up.

I still have no way to fight back though, even with my newly developed ying-yang orb attack.

Huh?

What the?

What's that behind Mystia?

There's a purple box closing in on her.

Is Mystia not noticing that?

It's stopped...

And it's firing bullets to Mystia.

It hits her against her back making Mystia screech, stumble and start falling down to the ground.

_"Go! Go! Get her!"_ The voice screamed to me!

Hey, who are you anyway?

Just wondering.

Well, you don't have to tell me twice!

I charge forward and leap up into the air.

"YARG! GOHEI SMASH!" I yell with full intention of smashing her.

And indeed I did!

CRACK!

...

I think I got cripped one of her wings.

Mystia starts moving again, with one of her wings much more bent than usual.

You better hope thats not permanent.

"My wing! You hurt my wing!" I'm not going to eat you anymore! I'm gonna blind you and hurt you!" Mystia screeched, with a full intention of vengeance with me hurting her.

She slowly steadies herself in the air, slowly though, as she had a broken wing.

**{Night Blindness "Song of the Night Sparrow"}**

Night Blindness?

That doesn't sound too good.

She disappeared into the darkness.

Darkness?

It just got pitch-black!

I can barely even see my gohei!

Huh?

When did those bullets show up?

They just showed up in front of me!

"GAHH! I scream in pain as I close my eyes against the unseen bullets.

The small bullets just ram against me continuously and they hurt too!

They're not as bad as the circle shaped ones but these sting!

Where are they all coming from?

"OW! OW! GAWK!" I scream in pain again, finally noticing that it was coming from the right this time.

I'm getting hit mercilessly!

My eyesight...

It's starting to get bleary and I don't think it's because of Mystia's spell card.

I hurt all over.

If this keeps up, I'll lose!

I''ll have to use it then before it's too late.

This is the perfect time to use it!

I'm counting on this to work!

All or nothing!

I start to form the former blue-white orb that I had used against Wriggle in my hand.

There was no divine feeling though.

The blue-white orb that I started forming once again, required my energy, which I gave it.

Great. I'm completely spent. This better work!

Soon it was completed and it gave a bright light, illuminating the darkness that Mystia created.

My gohei could be seen and the surrounding areas were shown to me.

This is much better.

Incoming bullets from the front!

I charge forward with the sanctifying orb in hand, absorbing any bullets that came in contact with it.

The orb grows bigger suddenly, and I almost lose control of it because it was now heavier.

I can see Mystia!

COME ON! WORK!

"GO! **{HOLY RELIC! "YING-YANG SANCTIFYING ORB!"}"** I yelled out before colliding right into Mystia with the orb in hand.

...

**BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!**

**POW! POW! POW! POW!**

...

**?**

My hearing...

It's gone.

My eyesight is only able to plain white.

I feel...

like I'm as light as a feather.

I'm just floating in the air in a lying position.

Am I dead?

Is the journey over already?

"You're not dead yet you know." I hear the feminine voice again.

"I'm not?" I ask the voice.

"Of course not. See? Your friend saved you!" The voice said rather happily that I was still alive.

My friend?

Does she mean Yukari?

The world flashes before me, and the whiteness disappears.

...

**Gensokyo: Path to the Human Village**

"NGGH!" I grunted as I force opened my eyes.

I'm against the dirt floor where I fought Mystia.

I'm alive?

Who was that voice?

She's been helping me for a while.

Who is she?

"Oh? Your awake! I was wondering when you would recover." I hear a voice.

"Yukari? Is that you?" I asked rather pathetically, as I could barely talk above a whisper.

"Yes, it's me." Yukari answered to me, floating above me on a gap again.

"How am I alive? The last thing I remember was being sucked into my own spell card attack." I asked Yukari, hoping that she would have the answer.

"Yes, you did do quite a risky move! You blew yourself up with that night sparrow. Honestly, doing something that stupid? What were you thinking Akyris?" Yukari confirmed and asked me at the same time of what I was thinking.

"I wasn't thinking at all. Just about winning." I answered honestly to Yukari, still down on the dirt road.

"I had to come in and help you pull yourself out of your little stunt and help you with that night sparrow's attacks! I really hope you don't scare me or do something like that again! I was almost a second too late!" Yukari confirmed my previous question of how I was still alive.

So she helped me out?

"Wait. That purple box that shot Mystia from behind... that was you?" I asked a rather obvious question.

"Yes. That was me. I summoned that border to shoot. You were doing so badly against her and I couldn't help but feel sorry for you!" Yukari said.

So, she did help me.

"Thank you for saving and helping me." I thanked Yukari for her help graciously.

Hmm, I still have some questions.

I'll just get them answered now.

"How did you save me from my own attack?" I asked, very curious of how I had survived that big explosion.

"I had to gap you from the moment the explosions started. It's one of my powers. I control the boundaries of many things!" Yukari excitedly told me about her endeavor.

"Gap me? What do you mean?" I asked.

I really don't get that at all.

"I simply opened a gap that sucked you in and teleported you here, though you were still caught in most of the explosion." Yukari answered, showing a demonstration of opening a gap and having it drop a small ball.

Oh...

So that's how it is.

That's really useful.

So that's how she got that popcorn during my fight against Wriggle.

"Where's Mystia?" I asked, rather worried that she could have been killed.

"The night sparrow? She's lying over there on the tree trunk." Yukari explained to me and looked toward the tree where Mystia lied.

She's alive!

Even with a crippled wing and a giant explosion, she survived!

I sigh a breath of relief to myself that no one was killed.

"Your wounds should be gone by now. I removed the border of natural body healing from you, so you can heal much faster than normal!" Yukari told me.

She...

She's right.

My injuries are mostly all gone.

Some of them are a bit touchy here and there, but otherwise, they really are gone!

I slowly pick myself up and notice my trusty gohei also lying neatly next to me.

Thank you whatever god is out there!

Hey, Yukari is ditching me!

As I pass by Mystia, I give her a small bow in hopes of her getting better and run off in the direction of the human village with Yukari.

The battles in Gensokyo are intense.

My powers are weak, but I know I'll push through and persevere to the end.

That happened so many times in anime and manga so maybe it'll work here too!

I only hope that it only gets better from here. And not any worse.

Because next up. Is Keine.

* * *

**AN: My first 2 fighting scenes ever. I used Reimu's spell card from Scarlet Weather Rhapsody while Wriggle's and Mystia's were both from Imperishable Night respectively. I think I did OK though R&R's are always nice!**

**RATE AND REVIEW PLEASE!**


	5. Incident 1: Imperishable Night Part 3

**A.N: Yes, I took so long but here it is! Chapter 5. Days of typing and this is the longest chapter I've ever typed. 2 fights and I'm sure you can guess who it is. It's so hard to write when you barely have any attacks to work with. Enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter 5: Double help from the Boundary Youkai**

**Gensokyo: Human Village**

This is pretty weird.

I'm pretty sure that moments ago, I saw the human village while I was fighting Mystia.

Why is it all gone?

There's no houses at all.

Not even a shop or a single person is anywhere.

It's like it didn't even exist at all.

I remember just skipping through all the dialogue in the game because I got impatient and just wanted to fight.

The next person I have to fight next is Keine Kamishirasawa who is supposed to be able to change history or something.

It's almost too quiet, something is bound to happen.

"Where's all the people and the buildings?" I asked myself, looking around for any sign of life.

How did it disappear so quickly in such a short amount of time.

Time is frozen yes but, who is it that could have done this? Or what?

This is starting to creep me out.

It's almost like a scary movie.

"Stop!" I hear a voice coming from behind us.

Oh and look who it is?

The next boss.

This isn't going to be like the fights with Wriggle and Mystia who were animal youkais.

No.

This is Keine Kamishirasawa I'm talking about.

Her spell cards killed me in the actual game.

If it was hard there, it's going to be at least 100X harder in here.

For me, this doesn't even seem fictional anymore.

It probably never was for Renko and Maribel.

Gensokyo exists without a doubt.

Why else would I be going through this?

I never wanted to, though if it's for the sake of the world, it has to be done.

My attacks are too limited to do anything on it's own so I'll really have to rely on Yukari to help me.

I got completely lucky with the last two fights that my attacks even worked so well as they did.

If it wasn't for Yukari helping and saving me during my fight against Mystia, I'd be dead for sure.

Oh she's finally in front of us.

In all her glory with her blue bento hat included.

...

And flying like the youkais I fought so far...

"You're the ones who froze the night, correct?" Keine asked me with an angry tone.

"Uhh, yes we did. Why?" I asked Keine, rather confused about what freezing the night would had to do with the village.

"I won't let you lay a hand on the humans." Keine declared, moving back a bit, probably to start shooting me.

Wait your assuming we're here to hurt the humans?

What did you even do to them?

That makes you even more suspicious than us!

I can't believe I'm thinking this at this point but...

I'm a shrine maiden, a miko of the Hakurei Shrine damn it!

I know I'm basically I'm a girl but...

Yeah.

This world as I've seen, only has females so far.

Oh crap!

Keine looks like she's starting to attack!

She spawned 4 white orbs?

AHH!

SO MANY BLUE BULLETS!

AND THEIR CIRCLES AGAIN!

Are they gonna hurt like crazy if I get hit by it?

Ack, no time to think, gotta move!

At first, the blue circle bullets aim toward me, but then break away from it's starting pattern, forming gaps in between.

Ok, theres the gap.

Let's rush through first.

I run toward the gap before the circle bullets overlap with each other, making it impossible to go through without being hurt.

I take steps back as the blue bullets continue to spawn and break off from the pattern, forming gaps in between.

I continue to dodge and weave through the bullets with the same method of rushing through the gaps and then moving back to wait for the next gap to appear.

The bullets cover up most of my sight, and I barely notice Keine spawning 4 more shooter orbs.

And just like before, they too start firing the same patterns as the first 4 orbs.

Hey wait a moment.

I see the gap but.

It's too small!

I'm going to get hit!

Damn, I might as well minimize what I can.

I run toward the small gap created from the broken patterns of bullets.

I feel one of the bullets scrape against my arm and it feels blunt, just Mystia's red circle bullets.

"ACK!" I grunt in minor pain as it feels as if a smooth rock scraped my arm.

Ouch, that hurt.

Easiest game my ass.

I swear, all the other games better not be this hard or I'm going to die.

Let's try the yin-yang attack.

I open my palm and start pouring energy into it while rushing through the gap and moving back as fast as I can to give myself more time.

Ugh, it's time to rush through the super small gap again.

If I get hit, I might lose my orb and waste energy instead.

Wait, what about the right side?

Yes!

It's clear!

I run toward the right, between the blue bullets and clear myself away from the small gap.

Ok, steps back.

And my yin-yang orb is finally ready.

Now I have to find a way to get closer without getting hit, otherwise I might lose my attack.

Let's try this then.

Here comes the gap.

I run through with ease and step back to wait for the smaller gap to appear.

And there it is!

I charge forward with full speed, intending to crash through it.

I raise my arm with the orb and ram it against Keine's blue bullet.

Keine's bullet disappears as my orb claimed victory over it.

I'm not clear yet though!

I'll have to brace some bullets if I want to get to Keine.

CHARGE!

I sprint as fast as I can and run myself against one...

two...

three...

four...

YES! I MADE IT!

I have a clear shot at Keine.

I stop in my path, aim and force a surge of energy to my hand, firing the orb toward Keine.

As soon as it fires, I immediately charge up another yin-yang orb and start running toward Keine again as the orb sapped my energy.

The first orb hits her, but she doesn't fall down like Mystia did and just shakes it off.

She still continues to shoot bullets even though I hit her.

That's a tough body Keine.

Well, eat this then!

I stop dead in my tracks and stick my arm out to force another surge of energy, this time, aiming as accurately as I can to her hands.

I get a running start and jump as high as I can behind the ying-yang orb.

To my surprise, she dodges it, but I was still determined to get my own hit on her.

I grab Keine's left shoulder and ram my gohei into her stomach area as hard as I can with the pokey end.

She leans her face forward and I give her a solid right punch to the face before letting go of her shoulder and dropping down.

I land in a kneeling position while watching Keine stay in the air of where I hit her.

She recovers and points her arm in my direction with her palm out.

**{Spiritual Birth "First Pyramid"}** Keine activates her first spell card.

Immediately, 6 orbs spawn from Keine and start launching the same blue circle bullets they had shot before Keine had activated her spell card.

So what makes this a pyramid?

The shots seem random and give me various small and big gaps to fit through.

Suddenly, Keine shoots 9 bigger versions of her blue circles and they look like the size of a human!

They're in a triangle though.

So that's why it's pyramid.

Only the front 3 of Keine's bullets aim for me while the smaller bullets from the orbs still seem random.

Ok.

All I have to do is fake Keine out by going in one direction and move along the gaps of the smaller bullets, then move the other way really fast so Keine doesn't get me with those bigger circles.

I don't think it would be really pleasant to get hit with those.

Ok, here it comes!

Move to the right.

Go through the gap over there.

Here comes the big circles!

It's coming to my direction.

I push off to the left with both feet to dodge the big blue bullet.

Wow, that wasn't too hard.

Huh?

Oh Crap!

She fired another set!

I'm not gonna move fast enough!

**POW!**

"AHHHHH!" I scream as a big blue circle bullet from Keine suddenly rammed at me and exploded on me.

I fly back several yards before landing back on the ground and rolling a few feet.

"Ughh..."I struggle as I slowly recover and get back up from the blow.

That hurt...

Alot more than the normal shots.

My rib feels like it's gonna crack.

Stupid Keine...

There's no way the yin-yang orb will help through this.

The bullets from Keine are just too plain strong.

It'll just destroy my attack.

!

I just had a great idea.

There's no certainty that it'll work but.

Who said my attacks always worked?

Ok.

Here comes the smaller circle bullets again.

Left this time!

Ok theres the gap!

Keine fires her first few blue bullets.

Jump back!

There's Keine's second wave!

I should have seen that coming last time!

Ok

Another jump back.

However, before the last blue circle bullet from Keine passes...

I swing my gohei as hard as I can like a baseball bat at it.

Oh god this is heavy!

But, my gohei doesn't break and it completely follows through with all my strength, sending back Keine's own bullet.

It completely pushes past the smaller bullets and hits Keine directly, ramming into her and exploding.

Whoa, talk about lucky!

I just hoped it would hit!

How do you like a taste of your own medicine?

She didn't see it coming at all!

And even better, she's falling through the sky to the ground!

Combo time!

I rush toward Keine's falling body and just before she lands on the ground, I kick her as hard as I can on her back, sending her back into the air a little higher.

You know, for a girl, Reimu's melees are pretty decent.

Is she practicing or something?

Oh well.

I just jump up to position myself in front of Keine's body, and smash my gohei against her stomach, sending her back down again.

However, this time she doesn't hit the ground.

She floats!

And she flies back away from me.

Keine pants heavily before saying, "Ughh..., just who are you guys?"

And shes starting to fly off!

"Hey, come back here!" I scream toward Keine as she flew away from me while I ran to keep up with her.

She turns back and fires a few more circle bullets at me which I easily dodge.

"Stop running!" I yell at Keine as she continues to fly off.

Fine, I'll just shoot you then.

I charge up a ying-yang orb while continuing to dodge the bullets Keine shot at me while flying away.

Ok, now aim...

Fire!

I send a surge of energy to my arm, launching it toward Keine.

...

And misses.

I should get better at aiming.

Let's try again.

I charge up for another yin-yang orb again.

Here comes some more bullets.

They're really scattered so it's not hard, though she is flying away at the same time.

Run a little to the left.

A little more.

And...

It's done.

Ok

Aim...

This time, I'll angle it with the timing.

Fire!

I send another surge of energy to my arm and it launches toward Keine again.

It's gonna hit!

**POW!**

Now I got her!

However, Keine only stumbles from my attack and just turns around to retaliate fire with her own bullets.

That didn't even work!

Despite my recently created attack from Mystia, it's ineffective against Keine apparently.

That's twice my orb hit now and it's almost practically doing nothing against her.

It needs more power somehow.

I need to conserve mine though and the yin-yang orb materializes from its spirit form to its solid form by itself after I fuel it enough energy.

I get hit too much so I need whatever I can take.

Wait a moment.

Thats it!

The ying-yang orb has its own limit set for itself right?

So that means that all I have to do, is just figure out what the limit and size of the yin-yang orb is and then somehow give it enough energy to bypass the limit to create better effects!

This is going to waste my stamina, but without this or Yukari's help which doesn't seem to be coming, I won't win.

I don't think another spell card is going to come to my aid this time!

She's still flying and it doesn't look like she's going to stop anytime soon so now is the perfect time to find out now before she decides to really attack me!

Ok, let's start.

I'll do this while running, otherwise Keine might think something's up.

I have my unarmed hand start to gather energy from me and the same sphere shape forms when I decide to create a ying-yang orb.

Oh crap!

Here comes her normal bullets again.

No problem, I'll just go through this quick and see how far the orb will go.

I slow down my running and the bullets land on ground harmless, and I start focusing on the incomplete ying-yang orb again.

Ok it's done.

It's about the size of a rubber ball.

I never noticed the size back then, but now that the fight calls for it, I have to.

Maybe it's the timing and the amount of energy I put in?

I gotta speed through this fast though before she decides to attack me.

Speak of the devil, and she stopped.

"You're so persistent." Keine said as she turned around to face me.

Oh great, my orb disappeared.

"What happened to the village and its people?" I asked Keine, curious of how there was nobody around even when I saw the village earlier.

"I merely hid it from your kind." Keine answered, while coming closer to me.

"We can't linger here Reimu. Even with the frozen night, the moon will still sink." Yukari said from behind me.

Whoa!

Where did you come from?

And how come you didn't help me when I was clearly in trouble from Keine's first spell card.

"All I did was just hide the village from you youkais. I won't allow you to harm them!" Keine said with fierce determination in her eyes.

"Hey you know, I do see all the humans walking around and the buildings so this ability of yours isn't working." Yukari commented on Keine's ability.

Really?

This makes you seem really overpowered Yukari.

Actually, you probably are.

And Keine makes a pretty surprised face.

It's almost priceless if you ask me.

Almost cute.

"Who are you two?" Keine asked Yukari and me with a questioning and a scared look.

You do realize that, if we were after the humans, Yukari would have went after them already since she says she can see them anyway.

Ahh, well.

"Either way, I'm not going to allow you two to hurt them!" Keine declares once again before sticking her arm out.

**"{Ambition Sign "Masakado Crisis"}"**

Another spell card huh?

Bring it on!

I probably shouldn't be saying that when I have almost no chance to win though.

...

That's alot of smaller bullets.

I don't think I'll EVER get used to this.

Yin-Yang Orb charge go!

And it starts forming in my hand again.

The bullets around Keine almost seem to form a picture though.

Of a flower?

I honestly don't know.

Too much blue in it.

The gaps are there, small but I think I can get through this.

Bullets are almost here.

And my orb is almost done.

Let's try it now!

I push more energy into the orb to try and break it's normal limit.

...

Nope, still normal size.

I think I did it too early.

I don't have time for another one though.

The bullets are here.

Matrix time!

I run to the right again,

Only to find that the gap that was previously there, was gone!

Oh crap!

OW! OW! OW! OW!

I release my hold over my ying-yang orb and it flew off in a random direction, colliding with other units and eventually disappearing.

This hurts!

I fall down onto my right knee and look up.

Here comes another one!

I use my gohei to use as support to get back up and start sprinting to the other side in hopes of finding a gap.

I see one!

It looks so far though!

Ugh, screw that gap!

I'm making my own!

I stop running and plant my feet firmly onto the ground, preparing to strike another bullet with my gohei.

Baseball style again!

**TWACK!**

I smack the bullet back and I quickly drop my position to quickly form another ying-yang orb.

Here comes another set of bullets.

Form faster!

Come on!

I push even more energy into the orb making it become bigger at a faster rate.

It's almost here!

I'll just shoot the bullets with my orb then.

I don't want to take another hit!

I raise my hand out toward the oncoming bullets, closing my eyes as I turn the other way and send a surge of energy into the orb as the bullets collide and integrate with the orb.

Huh?

What happened?

My eyes open and turn towards my own attack.

!

The ying-yang orb.

It's...

Bigger than my normal sized rubber ball.

And it's getting bigger too!

It hasn't materialized yet either!

This is it!

The previous rubber ball sized orb quickly continued to grow to the size of an exercise ball and just kept getting bigger.

It's draining my energy, but I'm sure this will be well worth it!

You won't leave unscathed with this yin-yang orb this time Keine!

It's back for revenge!

I send a final stretch of energy into the orb, materializing it into the now human sized orb.

Now, I'll get you!

I start running towards Keine and block all the bullets in my path with the improved yin-yang orb.

Urgh!

Of course.

This means I need even more energy to launch this beast.

I stop running, and grip my gohei armed hand onto my other outstretched arm to support it to fire the orb.

There we go!

Keine attempts to stop the humongous orb by focusing all her bullets onto it.

All of it disappears on contact with it though and it smacks Keine entirely.

She's blown back by the pure force of power by it and her bullets even cease to exist.

I take deep breaths to regain some of my lost energy.

It looks like there's a cost to it.

In order to become bigger, I have to push the amount of energy given at the last second. That will break past it's initial limit and become bigger, but it'll also drain my energy at a faster rate.

It saved me though. I don't think there was another way I could have stopped her.

Ugh, despite that I'm happy she's stopped, I don't think I can do that again.

It's like a last resort.

It takes away my energy too fast even though it seems really strong.

I don't think I'll use it again unless I really have to.

And it looks like she's finally recovered from my super powered attack.

She looks slightly angry though.

**"{Land Sign "Three Sacred Treasures - Mirror"} **I hear as my body fills up with fear.

What?

I remember Lokon playing against this card!

She immediately flies slightly higher and fires off blue and red kunai looking bullets!

Those look easy.

Huh?

It's this feeling again.

That bad feeling.

_"No! Don't go through it!"_I hear the voice telling me to not engage the bullets directly.

I'll trust the voice this time.

Then again, when has it ever been wrong?

Instead of going through the red and blue kunai bullets, I run left instead.

I turn my head behimd my shoulder to see GIANT green circle bullets going toward the direction behind me.

Phew.

I don't think I need another reminder of being hit by them.

Here comes another wave!

I run back in the opposite direction I initially ran as fast as I can to prevent being hit by the incoming green circles and the normal red and blue bullets.

Bullets filled my path as I atttempted to duck and jump over each 1.

I didn't reach safety in time though.

**BAM!**

"AGGGGGGHHHHHH!" I scream in pain as the last green circle smashed against my arm.

MY ARM!

MY LEFT ARM!

IT HURTS!

I fell to my knees, supporting myself with my right arm with my gohei in it.

The pain is completely unbearable.

It feels like a giant rock crushed my arm.

I don't have a choice.

I'll use my upgraded yin-yang orb!

It'll most likely leave me with almost nothing, but I have to win!

I slowly stand back up, with my left arm half limping.

It was movable, but it hurt like crazy.

I switch my gohei to my other arm and start to form my ying-yang orb.

It slowly takes form and starts growing into the it's normal rubber ball sized orb.

Oh no!

Here comes the bullets again!

_"Focus!"_ The voice tells me from nowhere again.

I'm trying here!

_"If you can make this fast enough, you can break through Keine's own bullets!"_ It tells me as well before suddenly disappearing like usual.

But the green circle bullet is really strong.

It almost single-handedly crushed my arm.

It's pretty much cargo for me to keep now since moving it just hurts.

This'll drain everything I have then.

Here goes!

The ying-yang orb starts forming in my hand.

It's going...

And here comes Keine's next bullets!

_"Stand firm! You can hold!" _The voice tells me, trying to convince me that I could hold off against the oncoming red and blue kunai looking bullets.

But, I can't take any more hits or I might not have enough to shoot my upgraded orb!

Fine, if you say I can hold, then I'll stand here.

I continue to charge up the sphere in my hand and it eventually starts nearing the point where it reaches it's limit.

But by then, Keine's bullets reach me and I brace myself for the impact.

NGGH!

These bullets sting.

A lot more than Mystia's.

The bullets scatter against my body, stinging all parts of it, including my hurt arm.

My body just feels exhausted now.

But luckily, my orb didn't reduce in size.

Phew.

It slowly saps more of my energy until it nearly reaches the normal size of it.

Ok now!

I pump out energy as fast as I can into the orb and it grows past the 1st limit.

There we go.

I relaxed and my energy output reduced, but was still being taken by the orb at a fast pace.

It's almost ready!

And here comes the next wave of bullets, including that green circle that wounded me earlier.

This is it!

This is a good size!

The orb was now a size of me.

I aim my good arm toward Keine and painfully raise my left arm to grab my right one for support.

I send a surge of energy into the sphere, making it materialize, and send another one to blast off toward Keine.

It crashes against the green circle and I keep hoping that mine will break through.

Come on!

I put everything I had into there!

**BAM!**

My ying-yang orb shoves aside the green bullet and went straight forward toward Keine.

All the kunai looking bullets dissipate as the power they contained was much more inferior compared to the sphere I created.

**POW!**

Headshot smack!

Keine completely stops shooting and starts spinning downward through the air while I get back up slowly using my gohei.

I'm not going to make it to her. I'm too far!

Eat this then!

Gohei Throw!

I raise my left arm in pain, and throw it as hard as I can toward the ground where Keine was going to crash onto.

I fall forward a little from the momentum of the throw plus my exhaustion and watch the gohei soar through sky to her.

**SMACK!**

Bullseye!

Direct hit!

And there goes my gohei again as it flies off into the distance just like with Wriggle.

Keine lands on the ground and rolls around for a bit and quickly gets back up into the air flying.

She flies higher into the air than her last spell card though.

Here it comes!

**"{Pseudo-History "The Legend of Gensokyo"}"** Keine declared into the night sky.

The name of it just makes it sound like this is her last spell card.

Let's hope so.

I'm gonna spell card this for sure.

Red.

Red completely filled my eyesight of the night.

It was bright.

The red arrow tip shaped bullets were shot in a pretty neat pattern.

Lasers.

They were everythere.

There's so many of them.

Is this even possible to dodge or graze through?

How would anyboy know how to dodge this?

Ahh!

My spell card!

I should use this before the lasers and bullets hit me.

I'm too tired to even move now.

That last ying-yang orb sapped nearly all my energy.

It's hard enough to stay conscious.

I charge up power for my own spell card, intending to end her spell card quickly.

The same blue sphere that I had created previously formed in the palm of my hand.

It's pretty much one-shot the bosses so far.

If this doesn't end it, I don't know what I'll do.

Here come the lasers!

A little closer!

Ok, it's ready!

I stand up on my legs and aim my Sanctifying Orb toward Keine whose lasers are assaulting me.

Spell card go!

**"{Holy Relic "Ying-Yang Sanctifying Orb"}" **I announce before having it fly towards Keine.

Keine completely stops shooting, but the bullets and lasers she already shot, enter my Sanctifying orb, powering it up and increasing it's size as well.

Wait.

What's she doing?

Don't tell me...

She's going to dodge it!

No!

Come on!

Hit!

I can't afford to miss!

Keine flies higher and my giant Sanctifying Orb passes her and continues on toward the forest ahead.

NO!

Suddenly, a gap with 2 ribbons on its end with eyes inside of it opens up in front of my spell card and it goes inside it, completely disappearing as the gap sealed up.

Huh?

Another gap opens up above Keine which she was flying toward.

?

And out comes my giant spell card!

It lands on Keine and explodes massively on her.

**BOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM!**

**POW! POW! POW! POW!**

It nukes the sky and a series of smaller blue explosions erupt from it.

The pure power of it flashed the night sky blue.

I look back behind me to see Yukari standing with her arms outstretched.

So it was her that helped me.

I smile gratefully to her for her help.

I look back towards the blue explosions as it started to cease.

_"She's not done yet. Don't feel safe just yet."_ The voice warns me.

Huh?

She's not done?

What?

Oh crap, it's right.

Where's Keine?

I look around to see that Keine was nowhere in sight or around my finished spell card.

Where did she go?

I start to panic and look around furious.

Oh no...

No!

No!

It can't be!

I looked next to the area where she had performed her previous spell card and saw Keine unscathed.

Clearly.

She must have changed the history of her getting hit by my spell card!

I should have seen that coming!

And it doesn't look like she's done either.

**{Future "Gods' Realm"}**

A complete horde of of blue lasers and red bullets filled the sky.

I can't see any weak holes in it.

This is it...

My only spell card failed to hit her.

I have no defense left.

I'm out of energy to move or to use any attacks.

I only had one spell card and I just used it.

It's hopeless now...

?

Footsteps behind me.

Yukari's starting to walk to me.

She pats me on the shoulder and walks past me toward Keine.

Is she suicidal?

That looks like it's impossible to dodge!

There's so many lasers and bullets around.

I'd get hit nonstop if I even tried to dodge all that.

She jumps into the air and starts flying toward Keine.

Directly at her?

Into the complete field of bullets?

_"Don't worry. She'll be fine."_ The voice in me tells me.

While she flies slowly toward Keine, Yukari materializes needles which launch themselves into Keine and it looks like their actually doing damage.

Her needles are continuous and they disappear into Keine though she still looks like she's getting hurt.

Keine even looks like she's struggling to keep shooting under the constant barrage of Yukari's needles.

One of the bullets and lasers is about to hit Yukari!

If she gets hit, she'll be in a world of pain.

"Dodge Yukari!" I yell at her, worried that she would get severely hurt.

**{Boundary "Quadruple Barrier of the Imperishable Night"} **Yukari quietly declares as she summons a border from herself.

The border completely evaporates any bullets and lasers that touched it.

Keine looks completely surprised, firing more bullets toward the barrier which only dissipates.

The barrier stays for a while before disappearing and Keine looks really tired already.

Is Yukari really this strong?

To be able to bring down a stage 3 boss with no problem while I was struggling so bad?

It doesn't even look like Yukari's finished.

**{Bounded Field "Mesh of Light and Darkness"} **Yukari activates another spell card.

Mesh of light and darkness?

Instantly. a border surrounded the entire battlefield even putting me in it.

Red and blue lasers spawned from the inside of the border and created a triangle formation from top to bottom with what seemed to be a near impossible dodge.

The lasers criss-crossed with each other only giving a narrow room to dodge.

The bullets that spawned in the areas from the lasers that combined were even small circles that Keine had fired at me and Keine's lasers and bullets were completely replaced by Yukari's own lasers and bullets.

It was safe to say, Keine had no chance at all to stop Yukari.

Keine was assaulted everywhere from the surrounding lasers and bullets, eventually falling out of the sky and onto the ground with her spell card broken.

"No way..." I said to myself, still stupefied of how Yukari with just the use of 2 spell cards, stopped Keine completely from her final spell.

Unbelievable.

It almost took no effort from Yukari to win.

She didn't even get touched by any of Keine's earlier mass of bullets that I was so sure was impossible to dodge.

Yukari flies over and lands next to me sticking her hand out to me.

Is she going to heal me by increasing my natural healing rate again?

I guess so.

Well, I'm just going to take advantage of this.

I don't think I'm going to get this much healing while I'm in any of the other games.

I slowly get up to avoid moving my left arm which was previously crippled by Keine.

"Wow! How did you do that Yukari? You beat her so easily, it wasn't even funny." I asked Yukari amazed, wondering if that can even be called a fight since Keine was just brutally beaten.

"Hmmm... I don't know!" Yukari replied, just shrugging her shoulders and arms before walking in the direction Keine fell down from with me following along.

Sure you don't know.

Oh, there's Keine.

Yukari and I walk up next to her and Yukari starts talking.

"You know that we really don't care about the human village or its inhabitants?" Yukari tells Keine with a devious smile on her face.

Yeah, you'd think she get that.

Keine gives a small sad face to us as compensation for misunderstanding us though at least.

"Tell me, where are you going anyway?" Keine asks us, still hurt from Yukari's spell card.

"That way." Yukari said as she pointed left of our decision.

"Uhh, we're looking for the one's who replaced the moon with a fake one." I told Keine.

"In that case, it would be that way toward the bamboo forest." Keine replied while she slowly got off the ground and pointing in a direction that was way off from Yukari's.

Wow, I can't believe your doing this.

Only moments ago, you were a hostile defender of the human village and now you're just giving us answers.

Well, I'll take that over persistence of fighting anyday.

And by the way Yukari, you're finger is way off from Keine's.

Makes me think less of you even though you can kick my butt anyday.

"Well, we'll be going now! Hope to see you again under better conditions!" I announce to Keine, walking in the direction of where she had told me where the perpetrators were.

And Keine waves to me with a smile on her face.

That smile is a very good cover for the damage you gave me.

I'd almost think you didn't do it if I wasn't actually there to see myself get completely beat.

At least she's friendlier than she was when Yukari and I just showed up at the place where I thought the human village was.

She just misassumed, though that almost lead to me getting killed and having Yukari intervene.

And Yukari just hops up onto her gap seat again.

Lazy bum, I swear.

Walking is honestly good for your health!

Better to have her as an ally though.

Hmm...

I just noticed and I know I shouldn't be complaining about this but...

How come my clothes never get ripped or anything?

Though if that happened, and the area burned or ripped was the chest area...

...

You know what, I'll just cease that line of thought.

I don't think I want to know what will happen.

Different thoughts though.

ZUN should have totally used a phrase for Yukari.

Something like...

You mess with the border, you get the Yakumo's wrath.

I honestly don't know.

Hey, I can see the bamboo forest now.

It looks pretty thick though.

Oh well, in we go.

I'll be pissed if Keine lied to us.

I can probably tell if I see Marisa wandering like in the game.

Oh yeah.

I almost forgot.

I fight Marisa next don't I?

At this point, it's probably impossible to win any more fights without any help.

I could get lucky and maybe get another attack, but I highly doubt that would happen.

I'm actually clueless of what attack I would get next.

And the biggest issue.

Flying.

Geez, everyone here can fly except me.

Yukari looked like she seemed to dodge much easier in the air rather than on the ground.

Not to mention, I always have to use a trick to pull any of the bosses down lower.

I remember taunting Wriggle to have her come closer to me.

I jumped and grappled onto Mystia and whacked her wing senseless so she couldn't fly.

Keine got her own giant blue circle bullet deflected with my gohei and I was able to melee her.

Those usual tactics are almost suicide though.

I don't even know how they worked.

If someone had a super long ranged attack, I wouldn't be able to do anything against it.

I can't jump that high, nor can I be accurate enough to fire a yin-yang orb that far.

With flying, I would be able to at least get closer to stand toe to toe with some characters.

Well, maybe not, but at least I'd get more mobility.

Speaking of which, I lost my gohei didn't I?

I got too tired to catch up to Keine to combo her so I just threw it at her and it flew off into the distance.

Well, I guess Yukari can just spawn me another one from her gap.

Main point though, I can't keep affording to keep losing my only weapon like that.

It's saved me and helped me so many times throughout my 3 fights.

Throwing weapon, blocking, deflecting, and more.

Yukari isn't going to be around to bring it back continuously everytime.

I better be more careful.

At least, my wounds are mostly gone though!

Yay!

3 cheers for Yukari and her great border healing!

My left arm is still a little sore because of Keine, but it's nothing major now.

"Hmm, I wonder..." Yukari says rather randomly to herself.

"Wonder what?" I ask the obvious question.

"Despite turning into Reimu and taking her spot as the shrine maiden, you do seem to lack the abilities she has." Yukari asks me while going into an anime style thinking pose.

That's true, but I just suddenly got forced here so what did you expect?

"I get to keep all of Reimu's abilities, but if I don't know how to use them like Reimu probably did, I can't use it." I answer Yukari's question.

"I see. That would make sense. To learn everything Reimu had in one day would be impeccable to anyone." Yukari commented about it.

"Despite that you would have no doubt, lost to Keine, the rate in which you're learning Reimu's attacks is incredible nonetheless. I never knew humans other than Reimu and Marisa would be this good." Yukari tells me while strangely complimenting me.

"You just do your best and I'll do what I can." Yukari adds in before stopping.

Wow...

I always thought I was doing terrible.

But she's right.

Learning all of Reimu's attacks and how to use them in one day would be impossible.

I always thought that I would be on my own so I would have to do it all in one incident.

I guess...

It's OK to not be that great during fights.

And it's fine to not know everything about the girl I assimilate into.

Coming from Yukari, I feel honored.

I get the feeling she rarely ever compliments people.

I give Yukari a soft smile and she gives one back.

Do my best huh?

A familiar voice breaks me out of my good thoughts though...

"Move and I'll shoot!" I heard with a rather energized voice.

Ack!

It's the cops!

Screw the authorities!

I'm outta here!

...

Like hell, I'm not THAT stupid.

And welcome Marisa.

"I messed up ze!" Marisa said as she flew into the scene with her broom.

Her clothes and her broom really does make her look like a witch.

Wait, what is she doing here though?

"What are you doing here Marisa?" I asked rather cautious that she would attack while I was off-guard with no gohei to defend me.

"I'm bored~! I'm just hunting a youkai that's being troublesome. What about you?" Marisa told me.

It didn't look like she would attack me.

"Well I'm out to hunting too!" You wanna join us?" I asked, hoping she would accept so I wouldn't have to injure myself so bad like all my other battles.

"No thanks! You wouldn't want to do it anyway." Marisa replied, floating in front of us about 15 yards away.

"What? Why's that?" I asked, curious of who the youkai would be that I wouldn't attack.

"Yukari is the youkai I'm hunting ze!" She explained to me while I turned back to Yukari.

Yukari?

Why her?

"You're messing with the boundaries of night and day aren't you? Marisa tells Yukari, probably remembering that Yukari was someone important.

"We froze the night so we could fix something." I tell Marisa vaguely.

Does she really not notice the fake moon?

I didn't notice it either until after Yukari told me, but she would have at least got word of it somehow.

I'll give her some help then.

"Well, don't you feel something's wrong with the moon?" I tell Marisa, giving a hint toward the incident.

"Yes, it would be very dangerous to continue to have it up there." Yukari pushes my hint along.

"I don't really feel anything bad though." I reply to Yukari, facing her to question what was wrong.

"What are you talking about ze? A never-ending night has trouble written all over it! Youkais can go around and eat the humans forever with a night like this. Pretty soon, the humans are going to die off you know!" Marisa says somehow keeping her cheerful voice.

That's true but you completely missed my point here.

"Gotta exterminate them all before they start feasting!" Marisa says before flying higher into the air with her broom, preparing to attack.

Here we go!

And here she comes!

"Yukari, gohei please." I tell Yukari as she opens her gap and it shoots out my gohei at me.

I catch it, feeling it's light weight again.

Man do I feel so much more comfortable fighting with this!

Let's do this!

And it looks like Marisa ain't gonna show mercy since it looks like she's activating a spell card already.

All right, this just makes things faster.

**"{Magic Space "Asteroid Belt"}"** Marisa calls out and starts firing her initial bullets.

This doesn't look like a spell card I've heard before.

Or not.

Oh my god!

Stars are coming from her.

Really fast too!

There's big red and blue ones flying toward me!

Then there's the green and yellow smaller stars coming from sides.

I don't even have enough time to plan out my strategy to counter it!

Even Yukari's caught in the AoE of it!

And she's already starting to dodge it like it's just another walk in the park.

Aggh, I'll just focus on the bigger ones!

The smaller ones, I don't think will do major damage.

Here it comes!

I start moving left and right randomly as fast as I can to keep up with the speed of the big blue and red stars and to get between the gaps.

They fill the entire surrounding area.

It's so overwhelming!

And eventually...

**POW!**

"OW!" I scream since one of the bigger stars rams itself against me, pushing me back into even more stars.

OW! ACK!

This isn't helping that I'm chaining against the other stars!

I force as much of my power into my leg as possible to stop myself from being pushed around into the other stars.

Phew!

Close one!

Back in action though!

It just keeps going!

Does she even have a limit!

I weave in and out, running in one direction, then pushing off with my leg to move back to move away from the bigger star bullet,

Marisa shoots off her own wave of smaller bullets toward me to join in along the big bulelts.

I didn't see it coming as it hit me and pushed me back against another one of the bigger star bullets.

"ACK! OW! OW!" I scream once again in pain as I bounced off multiple stars.

I crash onto the ground, flat on my face.

...

God, my back hurts.

I swear, I saw flashes of white just from that.

I get back up to try again and not leave myself open to attack.

I repeatedly move left and right randomly to prevent from being hit again.

The smaller bullets hit me and sting just as much as Keine's bullets, though my mind didn't focus on that.

I can't even see her because of all these bullets in the way.

I gasp for breath quickly as Marisa finally stopped her onslaught of bullets.

These star bullets...

They're slightly weaker than Keine's but much more numerous.

First spell card, and I've already wiped out about a fifth of my energy.

I guess I'll be depending on Yukari for support.

Marisa's supposed to be one of the strongest humans in Gensokyo along with Reimu.

I don't stand a chance on my own.

"It's not over yet ze! That was just a warm up!" Marisa said, confident that she would reign victory over both of us.

Warm up?

You gotta be kidding me!

That was a warm up?

That was insanely hard!

I got hit so many times during that spell card and that was just her first one!

Now she starts firing a ton of multicolored big star bullets.

They're not exactly hard to dodge, but one mistake could probably end with me in a lot of pain.

Let's see if I can fire a normal yin-yang orb at her.

It doesn't look like she'll be moving anytime soon.

I charge up my yin-yang orb, paying no mind to it as I continued to weave in and out of Marisa's bullets.

Yukari was also dodging it as well, occasionally, opening gaps whenever she could to have it fire bullets.

Marisa dodges Yukari's bullets easily though and still retaliates with her own.

Ok, I can feel that the orb is ready.

Now to just wait until it's clear.

With this many bullets, there's no way I'm even going to get close.

"Yukari, I need some help clearing these bullets!" I yell at Yukari, hoping she would use the spell card that she had used on Keine and defeated blocked off her bullets.

She nods at me and stands still for a moment before...

**{Border sign "Quadruple Barrier"}** She quietly says as a purple box filled the area around us.

Hmm?

This looks like a weaker version of border she used on Keine.

Oh well!

It still absorbed all the bullets so I'm going to just go!

I let loose my yin-yang orb and it flies off toward Marisa.

She flies up to dodge it though.

Urgh!

Just like what Keine did!

Yukari opened a gap in front of my orb where it disappeared into.

Another gap was opened in front of Marisa, launching the orb directly into her stomach.

She doesn't fall though, but at least we got a solid hit on her.

Oh.

She stops shooting right after Yukari gapped the orb into her.

Damn.

I'm so glad Yukari is on my side.

That is one dangerous move.

Marisa holds her stomach a little bit, before letting go and saying, "I'm not going to lose this easily to you ze!"

**"{Magic Sign "Stardust Reverie"}"** annouced Marisa who was starting to fire a ton of smaller stars.

Damn it!

Another spell card already!

She spawns those white orb things just like Keine.

Since their only smaller bullets...

I'll charge up a normal ying-yang orb to protect myself from a couple of bullets!

And so it charges, going faster than normal and forming faster.

The white orbs circle around Marisa, creating star bullets around her as well.

Eventually, the white orbs reach a nearby tree and starts spouting all a ton of bullets behind me.

So, I can't move back or I'll get repeatedly shot by the star bullets behind me.

That's pretty inconvenient.

The bullets around Marisa start making their move and circles around her while I went in between each of the bullets.

They slowly head back toward Marisa and she fires them back toward me again in a circle pattern.

Evasion Time!

Run left!

Jump that one!

Block the one in front of me with my orb!

Land!

Run right!

As I continued to dodge the oncoming bullets, the white orbs that were previously outside, ventured back to Marisa in a circular pattern again while firing off even more colorful star bullets toward me!

It looks like the pattern ends here though!

She's gonna fire it again!

Oh no you don't!

I won't let you!

I send a surge of energy to my still intact yin-yang orb and fire it at Marisa, intending to stop her from repeating her spell card.

It's gonna hit!

Huh?

**SMACK!**

What the?

She hit it back with her broom!

And she goes back onto the broom.

Oh yeah?

Well 2 people can play at that game!

I hold position onto the ground and prepare to deflect my own attack back at Marisa.

**SMACK!**

I swing at my yin-yang orb as hard as I can with both hands and it flies back toward Marisa.

Come on!

Hit it back to me.

Marisa waits for the last second until...

**SMACK**!

And there it goes!

OK, here we go again!

I take position to prepare to hit it back to Marisa.

Easy hit!

But...

She launches a giant blue star at the orb right as it almost reaches me.

What's she intending to do?

The blue star crashes against the orb, making it fly faster toward me!

Oh no!

POW!

"GAWK!" I scream as I took a taste of my own attack.

I fell over onto the ground, gripping my stomach in pain.

I didn't know my own attack could hurt so much!

I slowly recover from my own attack and get back up using once again, my gohei as a support stick.

A giant green star almost collides with me in the face before...

A gap opens up in front of me, making the bullet completely disappear into it!

Phew.

Thank you Yukari!

Marisa has absolutely no mercy.

She even attacks me while I'm down.

I turn to my left and give Yukari a silent thank you for saving me from the future damage that Marisa could have done to me.

Did I stop her spell card though?

And her white orbs start spawning rainbow colored bullets again.

I guess not then.

Yukari backs off from the battle leaving me alone to fight again.

Star bullets were spinning around and I'm completely filled with adrenaline.

I'll try the yin-yang orb attack again!

I charge up the orb as it sucks energy away from me and starts to form.

I dodge a few more star bullets before the orb finally finished.

And now to shoot you.

Take this!

I fire my yin-yang orb and it soars into the sky.

Only to crash into one of the white orbs, dispelling itself and one of Marisa's support attackers.

Hey thats it!

I don't know why I didn't do this earlier.

If I just take down the white orbs, Marisa will only be able to shoot by herself!

Perfect!

I charge up another yin-yang orb to start destroying Marisa's fellow white attackers.

Aim...

Fire!

And only 8 more left.

But I can see the shots going down.

And it looks like Marisa is starting to notice to.

So what are you going to do about it huh?

...

And she spawns 2 more white orbs!

Oh come on!

Waste of energy..

_"Jump! Jump!"_ The voice screamed at me.

Jump?

Giant star bullet!

Ahhhhh!

I jump like the voice told me and the star bullet narrowly passes under me.

Thank you voice!

Mat

Hey!

She's flying off!

Was that what she was aiming for?

"Come back here Marisa!" I scream at her as she starts flying deeper into the bamboo forest.

I run after her while Yukari flies off after her with me.

I'm gonna blast you out of the sky!

I charge up my yin-yang orb, and it forms faster than normal just like last time when I charged it up against Marisa's Stardust Reverie.

At least I still know when to boost up the charge.

I push energy faster into it at the last second before it stopped at it's limit.

More star bullets incoming!

Yukari opens up a gap in front of me, and I watch it fire off bullets of it's own to counter Marisa's as they both collide and disappear.

Phew.

Close one.

Human sized yin-yang orb ready to be fired!

Try deflecting this!

I send the first surge of energy, making it materialize into it's solid form.

Aim...

and...

FIRE!

I send the second surge of energy, gripping my shooting arm with my other arm and watch as the my bullet charged forward toward Marisa.

She's not looking at it!

And...

**BAM!**

It hits her on the back and sends her off her broom!

Oh yeah!

Bullseye!

I rush to the area where Marisa was going to fall...

Only to see that Marisa gets caught by her flying broom and is back into the air.

Aww come on!

That was a good hit!

And she turns around to face me to fire more bullets.

Run slightly to the left!

Run to the right a little bit!

Jump over the next one!

So hard to keep up with flying enemies when all you can do is walk and run.

Marisa finally turns around, though she doesn't shoot any bullets this time.

"Oh hey Reimu! How's it going?" Marisa asks me as if she didn't do anything to me.

Hmm let's think.

I got shot by you and not to mention, you smacked my own attack back at me.

I don't really feel all that great.

"You know, theres a limit to playing stupid." I said, somewhat ticked off at her ridiculous comment.

"My last attack was more aimed to you. This one is for the both of you ze!" Marisa says before flying away for a little bit and activating another spell card.

**"{Love Sign "Non-Directional Laser"}"** activates Marisa as she spawned 10 white orbs this time.

I remember this spell card!

I don't really see how this is a love sign though.

It's mostly lasers if you ask me.

Speaking of lasers, five of the white orbs fire lasers in their own directions while the other 5 fired off both small and big stars consecutively.

Here it comes!

I wait for one of the lasers to reach me and I run away from it, jumping over the giant star as well.

As I run to the other direction, I watch Yukari dodge it as well, staying away from the multi-colored laser and moving through the giant stars.

Oh man!

The gaps between the giant stars so small!

Can I even fit through that without hurting myself?

Well, if I don't want to get hit, I guess I have to.

I'm about to run into the laser with the giant star barrage right behind me.

I don't even want to touch that laser!

I break with all the powers in my legs as the laser burns my arm a little bit, and leap back, hoping that the big stars wouldn't ram me.

I see the big stars pass me.

Phew.

I got lucky that time.

The laser the burnt me earlier is starting to come for me.

I turn around and start running away to the next laser.

I'm trapped!

The lasers will get me in both directions!

And I don't know if I got lucky, but the right laser disappeared.

Lucky!

I run off to the right.

Only to run myself forcefully against a big star.

OW!

It shoves me back and I fling backwards toward the laser behind me.

**HSSSSS!**

"AGGH!" I scream in pain as the laser just pass through my whole body and burnt it.

I can even see red marks on my skin.

GOD!

THAT BURNT!

Smoke might as well come out of my skin.

I touch my burn mark foolishly and I jerked my hand back as it stung just by touching it.

Yukari is starting to fight back against Marisa and is launching purple semi-transparent needles towards Marisa.

About time!

I can't even use my own attacks!

My yin-yang orb is useless because the laser will just blow it up for sure!

It's meant to take on bullets, not lasers.

And I get backed into another corner again.

My back faced the giant star barrage while the laser was coming toward me from the front.

Suddenly, a gap appears in front of me, dragging me into it, with the laser barely passing me.

?

And I'm falling down from the air down to Marisa.

I'm falling?

GAAH!

YUKARI!

WHAT WERE YOU THINKING!

_"Attack! Use your gohei!"_ The voice told me.

Uhh

Ok!

I raise my gohei over my head to prepare to stop Marisa's spell card.

Gohei Smash!

"YAAAHH!" I scream as I watch Marisa turn her head to see me about to whack her.

**SMACK!**

Direct hit across the back!

And Marisa stumbles off her broom!

Oh yeah!

Talk about a dramatic finish to this spell card!

Payback is sweet!

Did I mention that it feels satisfying just to do that?

Wait...

I'm still falling!

GAAAAHHH!

Gap below me!

I fall inside the gap...

and I land back onto the ground almost instantly on a one knee kneeling position.

Great combo Yukari!

And a nice save too!

Yukari is doing a lot more this time than the other times.

Though, she did finish off Keine for me so it's hard to say.

Definitely more than my first two fights though.

Marisa sure doesn't look too happy with the fact that I stopped her non-directional laser.

Well I guess I wouldn't be either if I got smacked across the back.

You're not going to stop us here though Marisa.

We have an incident to stop.

She's flying closer to us with her broom.

Didn't I knock her off though?

The broom must have caught her again.

Bummer.

When I assimilate as Marisa, that broom better catch me when I fall too.

Look's like she's not activating her spell card instantly after her last one.

She sends smaller star bullets at me this time though the area that it covers is small.

Easy dodge.

But I'll keep my guard up.

She might do something while I'm dodging.

I jump through the bullets and keep my gaze at Marisa to make sure she did not try anything.

Nothing out of the obvious.

Well, since your not exactly firing a ton of bullets, how about I attack this time?

I charge up a yin-yang and I feel my energy getting sapped away.

I don't think I want to try another upgraded yin-yang orb.

I'll just run out of energy.

Well the first limit is almost here.

Here we go.

Yin-yang orb version 2 go!

I push more energy into it and the limit is broken as the yin-yang orb continue to grow past it's first limit.

Here comes another set of smaller bullets.

Easy again.

Better try something new because my orb is almost done you know.

I run into the bullets, going left and right as the bullets passes me.

And she fires a bigger star straight for me.

And my orb is human sized.

I send the first surge of energy to materialize it again and aim at the giant star that Marisa just shot earlier.

I grab my orb arm with my other arm for support and send a second surge to launch it.

The giant star gets completely crushed and my orb just goes for Marisa.

Huh.

So you're going to deflect it back at me?

Well then let's go!

I won't get hit this time!

She quickly jumps off her broom and floats in the air.

She's gonna two hand her broom?

**BAAAMMM!**

I hear her broom collide with my attack...

Marisa struggles for a bit before sending it back to me.

Return to sender?

I'll do it too!

I grip my gohei with two hands at the bottom and stand in position to smack it back.

The orb is slower than the speed I sent it at though.

And Marisa fires a big star bullet at it.

It collides against it and the orb starts speeding toward me.

Not this time Marisa!

I use all my strength and swing at the yin-yang orb to force it back.

GURGH!

So heavy!

It's gotta be at least 3 times heavier than my normal yin-yang!

My hands feel like they're gonna break!

Marisa fires a big star bullet at me while I continue to struggle against my own attack.

Oh come on!

I exert as much strength as I can.

"YAAAGGHH!" I scream as I use every bit of arm power I had to force it back.

And I finally send my attack back toward the star.

Wow.

I'm surprised I could actually force it back.

The star only gets rebounded into another area in the night.

She's gonna hit it back?

I don't think I can take another swing though.

Oh.

Nope she only dodges on her broom.

I would have lost that deflecting skirmish though.

I feel so shamed.

It looks like shes going to activate her spell card this time.

**"{Light Sign "Earth Light Ray"}" **Marisa activates and sends 5 white orbs behind me.**  
**

What is she doing?

And she fires smaller yellow star bullets in a circle while she's at it.

Ok.

Gap.

Let's do-

_"Look out behind you!"_ The voice screams at me.

Behind?

**HSSSSS!**

"AGGGH!**" **I scream into the air as the lasers scorched me from behind.**  
**

MY BACK!

I retreat off to the right and the laser that burnt me shoots off into the air.

Around me, 5 lines of lasers while shooting out.

That burnt!

Here comes the yellow stars too!

I run up to meet with them and move left and right dodging, making sure I didn't come close to the lasers.

After the first round of yellow star bullets, the lasers stop.

Phew.

I almost ran into one of them.

So what shot the lasers?

I turn around and see the 5 white orbs Marisa shot earlier.

So that's what they were for?

Ok well, I'll just keep away from the lasers and block off the yellow star bullets with yin-yang orb.

Yin-yang orb go!

The usual blue sphere shape forms in my hand and quickly starts growing.

Hey the white orbs are right behind me!

I move to the right a little to avoid getting burnt again.

The lasers launch from the 5 white orbs and shoots out.

Yup, I was right.

So I can't move too far left or right.

And here comes the yellow star bullets again.

Yukari is off by the side, away from the lasers.

She nods at me silently too.

What do you want me to do?

Urgh, not now.

They're almost here.

Here we go!

And a gap pulls me in just like last time.

And I appear behind Marisa again too.

Gohei smash!

I raise my gohei over my head to smack Marisa once again...

And she turns around while swinging her broom across my face!

**SMACK!**

OW!

I start falling out of the sky and Marisa stops her spell card to chase after me on her broom!

This is gonna hurt!

Wait!

From the looks of it, shes not going fast enough to reach me perfectly so maybe I can still get away!

CRASH!

I land against the ground painfully and I quickly roll away to dodge Marisa's broom smash as it lands against the ground I landed on.

I get back up quickly and narrowly dodge a broom swing by ducking.

So it's a melee fight huh?

If I can't beat you in terms of danmaku and spell cards, I can at least beat you with melee then!

I swing my gohei in a wide arc, hitting her legs and making her fall down.

Flat on the back.

My turn!

Gohei smash!

And I miss because she rolls away just like I did.

She even swings her broom in a wide arc to knock me down too!

Copycat!

I jump and try to smash my gohei onto her face and it gets blocked off by Marisa's broom.

I shove my foot into her stomach area and she keels over.

Perfect time to do it!

I bend my legs down...

And give her my best right uppercut!

BAM!

Uppercut of the shrine maiden!

I made that up, but it sounds good to me!

Marisa flies back and lands on her feet with a bruise on her chin.

Great hit on her!

And she charges back at me to try and jab me with her broom.

Turn my body left,

To the right!

Head nod to the left!

Jump!

I jump as she swung her broom in a wide arc again.

Which was a big mistake as I am left vulnerable and she smashes me downward with her broom.

Ack!

She got me there!

I poke Marisa as hard as I can in her stomach and she keels over again.

I roll away and get back up onto my feet.

Marisa just recovered too.

I pant heavily from the small melee skirmish Marisa had just done.

So far, she's the only one who's able to fight close-up like this.

I'm going to lose completely though!

I stare at Marisa in her eyes as if trying to intimidate her, but she only gives off a fun-loving smile.

We both charge and our weapons clash with each other in the middle.

I struggle to push all my power into my gohei to try and force Marisa to crumble beneath me.

Damn it!

Work!

Unfortunately, Marisa's broom is bigger and stronger than my gohei.

Marisa starts gaining the upper hand as I slowly start kneeling down to the ground.

She turns her broom and knocks my gohei out of my hand onto the ground.

However, as quickly as I lose my weapon, I grab her leg and pull it, making her fall down.

At the last second, Marisa jabs her broom onto my chest, making me stagger.

I stagger for too long as Marisa gives a solid whack to my arm and I fly off onto the ground.

Ugh...

Huh?

My gohei.

I pick it up and stand back up slowly to face Marisa again.

She charges forward alone this time and I dodge to the right as she tried to smash my head and retaliate with a left punch onto her body.

She leans forward to the ground a little bit, but she swings her broom left.

Broom alert!

I catch it with my left hand and kick her in the butt and she falls down onto the ground flat.

Now I get 2 weapons!

Marisa stands back up rather quickly and just gives me one of her smiles.

Does she ever turn sad?

Her broom is pretty light.

No wonder she could swing it around with just one arm.

I run toward Marisa and swing my gohei around to try and get her across the face.

She ducks and gives me a kick to the knee, making me lose leverage and fall.

I land on the ground with a thud to my head and she takes back her broom.

I didn't get to keep it long did I?

She tries to smash me with her broom but I cut off her attack with my gohei.

I can feel my arms giving up because of the stronger weapon Marisa had and she's starting to put her against me.

I use both legs to kick her from under her legs to boost her off of me.

I get back up and prepare to fight...

only to see Marisa fly off into the air.

What's she planning to do?

She takes out a wooden object that's too hard to see.

She tosses it into the air and catches and shows it to me.

Looks like a plain wood object to me.

_"Run! Run!" _I hear the voice telling me.

What?

Run from what?

"Let's see how you do against this ze!" Marisa says to me before...

**"{Love Sign "Master Spark"}"** Announced Marisa as she fired a gigantic multicolored laser at me.

What!

Oh no!

Master Spark!

I attempted to run away fron the ensuing blast.

DAMN IT!

I can't get away!

No!

The laser engulfs me into it's destructive force and I can almost feel my body disintegrate.

"AGGGGGHHHHHH!" I scream as I get absorbed into the ensuing spark.

The laser creates massive burns all over me and the force of it pushes me back.

All my energy was sapped out of me as my body struggled to keep itself together to prevent from being blown to pieces.

My arms...

My legs...

My neck...

My feet...

They all hurt so painfully.

My eyes are completely closed as I waited for my life to end.

...

When I reopened it, a world of blank white filled my eyes.

Where am I?

All I see is white.

Am I dead?

I guess...

This is it for sure...

I guess...

My best wasn't enough to win.

It feels peaceful here.

Makes me...

Want to sleep.

_"No! Don't let yourself fall asleep! Keep your eyes open!"_ The voice tells me, trying to convince me to stay up.

But why?

The master spark is a completely devastating attack that can disintegrate virtually anything in it's path.

It's not as if I'm going to live past that attack.

In a few seconds, I'm probably going to some afterworld.

I'm sorry.

Renko and Maribel.

You'll have to find another person to help you.

_"Stay awake! You're still alive!_ _You can still win!_" The voice tells me, before leaving.

...

It takes me a while to take that information.

Hey what?

Wait!

What did you say?

Did you say I'm still alive?

...

Still alive huh?

I told Yukari I would do my best and it wouldn't do me any good if I gave up now.

All right then!

I'll keep fighting!

So how do I go back?

And the blank white space flashes before my eyes.

...

Ugh...

I force open my eyes.

I'm...

back at the forest?

The spark that sent me to that white world is gone.

AGGH!

OW OW OW OW!

That voice could have told me earlier that I would still keep all my pain!

Black marks are all over my body and I feel like shit!

My body just hurts all over and I'm still tired from Marisa's previous attacks.

My head is pounding like crazy too.

If I feel pain though, at least I know I'm alive.

Where was that white world though?

Oh well!

I'm back for another round Marisa!

This time!

You won't get me with the Master Spark!

I'll even use my spell card to take you out!

Let's do this!

I start forming my Sanctifying orb.

Shoot!

Marisa's going to launch another Master Spark!

I'm not going to make it in time!

"Master Spark ze!" Marisa shouted before launching another one at me.

Damn it!

I'll never shoot the orb in time!

**"{Boundary "Quadruple Barrier of the Imperishable Night"}" **I hear Yukari's voice from behind me.

About time Yukari!

I almost got killed!

The Master Spark crashes against Yukari's barrier which protects us.

The pure power of the master spark shakes the sky and I can even hear the low hum from it.

That is one strong barrier to block off the master spark

Stars come out from Marisa as well making it almost impossible to even come close to her.

Oh the orb is done too.

How am I going to hit her?

If I try launching it at her and she sparks it, it'll probably dissipate into the spark.

Up close then?

I remember against Mystia, my Holy Relic could suck up bullets even if I was up close.

Let's try that then!

Hey wait.

I can't fly up to Marisa.

Dang it!

Ok, I'll time it then.

I'll shoot it right after her next Master spark.

She has to keep the laser going and it'll hit her.

I only have one shot so this better work!

Wait for the next Master Spark...

She's charging up...

And...

Now!

I run out of Yukari's protective barrier and aim the sanctifying orb straight at Marisa.

Aim for the most center of the bullets...

There!

FIRE!

**"{Holy Relic "Yin-Yang Sanctifying Orb"}"** I yell out and send a surge of energy into my arm, launching it towards Marisa.

It absorbs the surrounding star bullets, growing quickly in size.

"Eat that Marisa!" I yell at Marisa as she turns her head toward my giant sanctifying orb.

Too late to dodge now!

It's gonna hit!

BOOOOOOOOMMM!

POW! POW! POW! POW!

The Master Spark from Marisa stops abruptly after my sanctifying orb collided into her.

Phew.

It hit.

Is it over?

I'm pretty sure I got a direct hit.

She even stopped Master Spark.

The explosions are finished.

And now for the smoke.

...

No way!

She's still in there.

And there's a light going on in the smoke!

"This isn't over yet Reimu!" Marisa shouts from inside all the smoke.

What?

**"{Magicannon "Final Spark!"}"** Marisa called out.

_"Run! Run!"_ The voice warned me.

You got it!

Anything with 'Spark' in it should ALWAYS be avoided.

I went through Marisa's Master Spark and I don't want to suffer through that again.

I run as fast as I can as Marisa launches her Final Spark clear out of the smoke and into my direction.

It narrowly misses me and I continue to run as fast as I can from the massive laser.

It's even bigger than the Master Spark!

The low hum is even louder this time, probably meaning that it was even stronger than Master Spark too!

And is it me?

Or is moving toward me?

It's coming closer!

I'm going to get blasted again!

I might not even get as lucky this time!

I'll just disintegrate if I get hit!

This is bad!

I can't even shoot back!

And there's red and blue giant star bullets coming from Marisa too!

I'll never be able to get through all this!

One of them hits me against my arm which staggers me.

**HSSS!**

AGGH!

Final Spark officially is OP in terms of power.

I stagger for one little bit and it burns my leg to no end!

As soon as Marisa releases her Final Spark, I take a deep breath to regain my air from sprinting non-stop away from it.

I fall over from exhaustion and continue to breath deeply.

I can't...

give up here.

It's only a big fat laser.

Who am I kidding, that laser is going to kill me soon.

I'm too tired to move and my legs just got burnt from the spark.

And the star bullets are still coming.

I struggle so much to even get back up on my feet.

If I'm going to die though, at least it'll be epic.

And Yukari just gaps in front of me, as if to protect me.

I'm about to ask her what she was going to do, but she turns around and just wags her fingers 3 times.

"No, No, No! You're not going to win against Marisa's ultimate attack Akyris. I'll handle this." Yukari says with a devious smile on her face.

That's true but.

I promised I would do my best.

And she raises her hands.

What's she doing?

A spell card?

**"{Bounded Field "Curse of Dreams and Reality"}"** I hear Yukari activate.

A new spell card from her?

She releases to orange balls that explode and release green and white bullets for each respective ones.

The green bullets spread out while the white one's home onto Marisa.

How does she create all these spell cards?

Marisa is directly hit by all of them and Yukari only shoots more and more of them.

It must suck to be Marisa right now.

**"{Shikigami "Ran Yakumo}"** Yukari follows up and a blur flashes across the sky and crashes into Marisa along with the bullets.

Who is that?

Whoever she is though, if she's helping us, she's an ally.

The mysterious figure slashes and pounds onto Marisa brutally and she falls down from the sky off her broom.

Damn.

Combo'ed.

I really hope I don't fight against Yukari anytime soon.

Marisa lands next to me with her broom in her hands.

"Damn it ze~! I lost!" Marisa admitted as the figure who attacked her disappeared and Yukari floats down slowly.

This is a total defeat for me.

I barely lived by the skin of my teeth.

ZUN.

You're awesome for having Yukari team up with Reimu.

"Just what the heck are you guys trying to do?" Marisa asked us as she slowly got up, helping me up as well.

"Well isn't that obvious? We're trying to find out who's switched the moon with a phony one." I told Marisa, slightly upset that she hadn't noticed it.

"Ohhhhhh~! That makes sense!" Marisa replied to me.

"I did see a new mansion over by the next thicket over there! Maybe you should check it out ze!" Marisa told me, pointing her finger left.

A new mansion?

Would that be Eientei?

_"Yes, it has to be. The people who switched the moon is probably in there."_ The voice told me randomly.

...

Well if the voice says it's true, I see no reason to doubt it.

Only problem is...

I'm hurt beyond repair.

I can't even move without causing pain to any part of my body.

"I'm going to go home to sleep. When I wake up, it better be morning or I'll beat you next time Reimu!" Marisa told me before flying off into the night sky with her broom.

...

You seriously didn't notice that I was too weak to be Reimu?

I only used 2 attacks, 3 if you count the Yin-Yang Orb version 2.

I'm pretty sure Reimu has at least 4-5 times more.

I guess it's better that way.

And Yukari flies over to me and outstretches her arm to me.

...

She probably used that border heal removal again.

I can feel my burns going away, though slowly.

"Thanks for your help Yukari." I thanked Yukari, even adding a bow of respect to it.

"I have to don't I? If you die, Reimu may never come back and it is my responsibility to see that the border is safe. Reimu and I maintain it and therefore, it is vital that Reimu returns." Yukari explained to me.

What happened to your lazyness?

Wow.

I guess Yukari can be responsible after all.

"Plus it's rather entertaining to see you get knocked around so much from such simple attacks!" Yukari adds in, giggling at my failed attempts to dodge.

Aww, thats mean.

"Well? Shall we get going? The perpetrator isn't exactly going to stop by themselves are they?" Yukari told me before jumping back onto her border seat and casually fly in the direction Marisa pointed to.

"Yeah, let's go." I agree with Yukari and slowly walk to allow my body to heal itself with Yukari's magic.

This is it.

I don't even know how I managed to get this far when I fail at doing my job.

Eientei.

Where the last 2 fights await.

Will I win?

I'm so scared that I'll lose to Eirin again.

Maybe.

Just maybe though...

and just like a star in the night sky.

There's always hope to win.

After all, how else did I win all my other fights?

I walk in the direction Marisa pointed off to and begin thinking positive thoughts of winning.

A mansion huh?

I wonder how it looks in the inside.

* * *

**A.N.: Long? It is to me. I won't be typing up or posting anything because this is the week for finals for me and I can't really screw around. I hope this chapter made up for it though! R/R Plz!**


	6. Incident 1: Imperishable Night Part 4

**Author's note: At long last, it is out! Finals we're pretty brutal on me and I had some personal problems to deal with. I'm sure you don't want to read this and just get on with the reading so go on ahead and read!**

**

* * *

**

Gensokyo: Bamboo Forest of the Lost

It sure is a pretty big mansion out in the middle of a bamboo forest. It's really Japanese-styled and really old-fashioned.

Then again, I don't really see any modern technology around here so I guess it's to be expected.

My legs still hurt from the battle from Marisa because she bombarded me with who knows how many spell cards and got me with the Master Spark.

Will I really stand a chance against the upcoming bosses? Even in the game, I remember dying so many times on just the stage alone because of the massive onslaught of bullets the enemies spawned.

From what I've seen though, there's been almost no enemies except for just the bosses.

"Well, shall we go? The culprit of this fake moon isn't going to stop without any interferences you know." Yukari tells me, glancing at me for a few seconds before turning back to the Japanese-styled mansion in front of us. It almost reminds me of the mansion where I saw Renko and Maribel.

"Yeah. Sure. We're not going to let whoever is doing this scott-free." I reply after a while and start walking towards the entrance of the mansion.

I push aside the screen door and immediately prepare my fighting muscles up in case any attacks would come. You can never be too sure or careful when there's always a risk of death involved.

The lights inside Eientei were dim, but enough to see anybody that moved and give sight through the hallways. The floors was just wood again.

Oh yeah, my gohei. It got completely destroyed when Marisa decided to Master Spark me directly. I should get it back.

"Hey Yukari. Before I forget, would you mind giving me another gohei?" I ask, turning my head to the right to face her. "It got destroyed when Marisa decided to hit me with her Master Spark."

"Hmm? Oh sure." Yukari says before opening up a gap next to me. Instead of just pulling the gohei out of the gap she opened, the gap just flung the the gohei at my head at a high speed.

It hits me and it probably left a mark on my head.

"Ow." I respond with very little emotion.

That hurt you know, despite my words and the emotion behind it. Couldn't you have just pulled it out and just give it to me? I'm semi-useless without it so please, at least let me use it with no problems.

"You really should learn not to lose your gohei all the time. You have already lost 3 goheis and it's not really good for you to lose another one." Yukari scolded me and wags her finger like I was some kind of naughty child.

Gee thanks. I don't really have any power over my gohei if it ends up getting lost or destroyed. I do throw it, but only because it was the only way to stop whoever I threw it at.

"Let's just go." I say to Yukari, slightly annoyed at her scolding and pick up my gohei before slowly walking in.

Yukari follows me, just keeping up with my walking speed as I walk slowly to be weary to any form of attack. Not really too good if I only got injured any further.

The path inside only looks filled with a straight hallway though. There's very few doors and I had a feeling that all of them would lead to either a dead end or something similar.

Hmm? What's that?

It looks like a rabbit. In the middle of a hallway.

_"Don't come close to it. It's a trap."_ The voice told me, though it was most likely I wasn't even going to try and come close to the rabbit.

And it looks like the voice was right, again. The rabbit starts spawning bullets that were similar to the ones I had first created though the rabbit's looked superior. That's almost pretty sad because that's like saying a rabbit was better at fighting than me. My pride even got hurt from it.

Enough though. Time to beat the crap out of this rabbit and get information.

I raise my gohei and allow it to block off the rabbit's bullets and just wait for the fail attempt to defeat me to stop.

And it does eventually. Now it's my turn to show you that I can win without bullets!

I raise my gohei over my head and proceed to smack the rabbit over the head to watch it fall over and faint.

That was animal abuse but it's ok. It's not like I killed it or anything and there's no cops to arrest me for it. Shoot though, I guess I hit the rabbit too hard. He or she isn't going to give me or Yukari any information of where to go.

I pick up the fallen rabbit and lay it against the hallway's wall to continue on my way to find Tewi since she was next. Just where is she anyway?

I continue walking deeper into the hallway with Yukari floating over my head with her gap seat.

**CLICK**

What was that? My foot stepped on a floor when I heard that.

_"Hey! Get out of the way!"_ The voice warned me before disappearing like it usually did.

Huh?

Suddenly, part of the ceiling disappears and numerous bullets fly at me though I don't know who did it.

Crap! I don't have enough time to block it! I raise my arms in defense and they hit me, though not with the sting or brutality I expected. Instead, they just stick onto me like tape and the bullets dissipated leaving behind a note in one of the bullets that had attached to me.

"If you are reading this, I have successfully pranked you! You stink!" The note had on it. The handwriting was slightly scrawled though it was still eligible.

I got pranked? Now I'm slightly angry at myself for not deflecting the bullets or anything. It's too early for Eirin to show up so only Tewi or Reisen could have done it. I'm on the 'Tewi did it side.'

...?

I heard giggles from above. Who is it?

A girl suddenly flies out of the triggered ceiling and stops in front of me while hovering in the air. Pink dress, white rabbit ears, and black hair.

Figures. It was Tewi who got me.

"Ha~! I pranked you! I got you!" Tewi shouts at me before flying off deeper into the 2 way hallway.

"Hey! Come back here!" I yell into the hallway and run off deeper to chase Tewi.

Wait.

Wait , wait, wait. Tewi is the midboss for stage 5 right? This should be stage 5 right now so I'm gonna have to fight her anyway. I should try and get a first shot on her since the bosses should be harder now and shes not firing anything at me plus she doesn't have any spell cards.

I start charging up my yin-yang orb in my hand normally to prepare to knock Tewi out of the hallway and to reach Reisen faster. My orb gets done pretty fast and I already start to aim toward Tewi.

I send the usual energy into my arm to fire my sphere off and it shoots toward Tewi much faster than the first time I had shot it.

**BAM!**

I score a direct hit on Tewi on either her leg or her feet and she starts falling out of the air like a plane slowly crashing down.

"Waaaah!" Tewi screamed as she struggled to stay up in the air, even going as so far to flap her arms like a bird.

I'm not going to let you stabilize and counter!

I jump up into the air, narrowly reaching the top of the hallway to reach up to Tewi and force her onto the ground by pounding her backside with my gohei with a powerful downward slice motion.

She slams onto the ground with a thud and I land on her back with her face down to the ground.

"Gotcha now!" I exclaimed to Tewi, satisfied that I had caught the little prankster.

"Ow ow ow ow ow! Please don't hurt me! I was bored because I've been waiting here for a while now! I won't do it again!" Tewi quickly exclaimed to me, finding a usual excuse for it.

Ok, that was surprisingly easy. I remember her being 10 times harder when I actually fought her. Talk about the easy way. I'm not complaining though, this saves me time.

But now it's information time. Let's see what I can get out of her before I let her go.

"So which way leads to whoever switched the moon?" I ask Tewi in the nicest voice I could ever muster.

"I don't know. I think Reisen knows though." Tewi told me with her voice muffled onto the wooden floor.

"Reisen? Is that another rabbit? And where is she?" I asked with a questioning tone, even though I clearly knew who she was from the game. I didn't know where she was though and if I wanted to move on with this incident, I would need to find her.

"Yeah! She's Eirin-sama's apprentice. She's just up ahead down the hallway. You can't miss her!" Tewi explained to me, with her voices muffled because of my forced weight on her.

Down the hallway huh? I guess you really can't miss her.

Only 1 hallway though? What kind of mansion only has one hallway with almost a million rooms and it doesnt look like it's going to stop.

Well, at least I averted a possible fight because I don't need to fight against Tewi before fighting against Reisen.

"Ok. Thanks a lot. You can go now." I said to Tewi as I slowly got off of her and she flew off deeper into the mansion.

Dang, that prank really got me cranky though. I got fooled by a rabbit.

Ok well 1 fight down, only 2 more to go. Reisen and Eirin.

Guess it's more walking then. The walls are starting to have some pictures now so at least it's a nice change.

I think my wounds have healed up since I can walk without any pain inflicted now. Walking with no pain attached to you sure feels great. I took that for granted because it was such a usual thing. I don't think I'll complain about walking pain anymore now.

I wish I had this kind of power though. You sure don't look overpowered Yukari, but your personality and your powers just make it almost impossible to win against you.

You completely stopped Marisa's Master Spark with a barrier and you have a servant to help you. You destroyed Marisa with your own combo too with a series of 2 spell cards.

It makes me even wonder how Reimu could even fight you like you said and probably win when you have all this.

"Hey Yukari." I spoke to Yukari, trying to get her attention.

."Yes? What is it?" Yukari replied while still hovering over me with her sitting on her gap again.

"How did Reimu manage to defeat you? You almost seem unbeatable with your incredible spell cards and your unbelievable dodging skills." I ask rather curious of how the boundary youkai was defeated by a shrine maiden.

"Hmm..." She wondered for a bit with her finger on her chin. "I don't know!"

You were beaten by a shrine maiden Yukari, shouldn't that etch into your memory? I'm sure if I lost badly in Gensokyo, I would remember who beat the crap out of me.

If Reimu has the power has the skills and power to beat Yukari, that makes her one of the strongest people though. I don't even compare to Reimu.

A voice breaks me out of my thoughts though.

"You're too late." I hear from somewhere before seeing Reisen fly and land in front of us.

Bunny ears, pink skirt while wearing a guy's tuxedo on top. Yup, that's Reisen.

She sure dresses weird though. You would almost think it was cosplay.

Too late for what though?

"I've sealed all the doors. You'll never reach the princess now." Reisen said to me in a rather cheerful voice.

Princess? Who are you talking about? Is there another person?

"So do you think she's helping the culprit Yukari?" I ask Yukari, hoping she would know.

"I don't know. Shall we blow her up and find out?" Yukari answers me, even suggesting we should destroy Reisen completely.

"Hmm? Are you just youkai? I wonder how you found your way here. Well, there's nothing to worry about though." Reisen said as she shrugged us off lke a pest.

"No I'm human you know." I explained to Reisen, hoping that she would consider letting us past her like Tewi.

"Humans are even less to worry about." Reisen said, though that comment insulted me since I was human and I managed to win against 2 youkais alone. Though she's not going to know though. It might even work to our advantage if she doesn't go serious on us.

Shouldn't you consider us more of a threat if we managed to get into your mansion though?

"Why would you worry, I wonder? This is your doing isn't it?" Yukari said to Reisen, accusing her of being the culprit.

"You mean sealing the Earth?" Reisen questioned us, though with that answer, that's probably going to give it away to Yukari that it isn't her.

"Seal the Earth? I don't get it." I ask, confused about what Reisen meant by sealing the earth.

"It has to do something with the fake moon. I don't quite understand it myself." Yukari admitted to not knowing much about this either.

"Ah, are you talking about the moon? That's master Eirin's strongest charm. It makes Earth cut off from the rest of the world. Do you understand?" Reisen tried explaining to me though I only got more confused.

Why would you need to cut off Earth? What, are there going to martians trying to invade Gensokyo? Isn't Gensokyo cut off from the rest of the world anyway? Even if whoever came from outside of Earth, I don't think they would be able to enter Gensokyo that easily.

"Wait, but that doesn't make any sense." I said, still completely clueless as to why Eirin would need to replace the moon with a fake one.

"No, humans can't understand something like this. Udonge, I do have stronger charms than this." I hear a voice from behind Reisen.

And Eirin finally decided to pop into the scene, landing next to Reisen.

"Reimu, she's the culprit. I can feel it." Yukari told me, though she called me by Reimu. I guess it just sounds more reasonable to call me than Akyris since I am a girl right now.

Wait though. Something's not right.

My mind is telling me that it's Eirin who did this but my body isn't. So which one is it?

_"It isn't her. It's not her who did this."_ The voice told me.

So it's not her? The game I played only had me face off against Eirin though and not anyone else. Who's doing this then?

"Really? Somethings telling me that it isn't her though." I replied to Yukari, deciding to give her my opinion.

"Now! Banish this fraud of a moon and return to us the real one!" Yukari ordered.

...

"It's too early to release this charm. Udonge. I'll leave this to you." Eirin said before leaving one of the doors behind her.

Despite her entering the door though, the voice is telling me that the way Eirin came in isn't the right way.

"All right. I won't let you enter any of the doors." Reisen said, sounding confident that she would be able to stop us in our tracks.

"Well we're going to get through you and get back the real moon from her!" I voiced out, praying that Yukari would help out in this battle just like the previous fights.

"Yeah since beating you won't bring back the moon." Yukari also commented.

"Heh, I haven't fought a battle for a while. My fingers are itching to fight." Reisen said, still confident that she would be victorious over both of us.

"I'll defeat you with everything I have. The Lunar Insanity!" Reisen declared.

"Lunar insanity?" I asked, slightly scared of what would happen if I became insane.

"I broke the mind of another human who came to the moon once. That one was weak." Reisen warned us of what it could do.

"This girl...She seems dangerous." Yukari said.

With insanity by her side, I would deem her dangerous too. Especially since I'm a human and not a youkai.

"The moon can drive people insane. So can you really beat me, the rabbit whose eyes contain the power of insanity?" Reisen questioned before flying farther away from us to start her barrage of bullets.

Here we go! We will beat you Reisen Udonge Inaba!

Reisen starts off by firing red gun shell bullets toward me and Yukari and soon, the entire hallway was filled with it.

Yukari is already weaving her way in and out of the bullets with almost no effort.

Reisen's bullets shot out fast at first, but then they eventually slow down in front of me and combine to create gaps left and right.

I run in between the onslaught of red bullets and force myself left and right quickly to avoid the oncoming red.

My body slowly got used to the pattern of the bullets and since I could dodge just as easily as Yukari, I charge up my yin-yang orb in the palm of my hand to counter attack Reisen.

As I continuously dodge, I could feel my orb near it's first limit and I push more energy into it to break the limit. The orb starts sapping my energy faster though it grew bigger at a faster rate than the first time I used it.

All right! It's ready!

I send the usual surge of energy though it now seems to take less energy than usual.

Is it because I'm getting stronger?

Ahh, no time for that now though! I gotta concentrate on the battle!

The orb launches out toward Reisen, dissipating any red bullets that came in contact with it and I follow the orb on it's trail by running.

I have to think of something new besides using the orb all the time. It's not always going to work so it's time to try something new!

And I got just the thing to try!

I jump up after my orb and use it as cover to block any oncoming danmaku.

As I approach the orb from the top, I use it as a stepping stone to push myself forward and charge up another orb in my hand as I propel myself toward Reisen.

I deflect any oncoming bullets that Reisen shoots at me with my gohei and as I near Reisen, I prepare to use my gohei to smash Reisen downward, similar to the way I smacked Tewi.

Take this!

**WHIISH!**

And unfortunately, my gohei only slices through air as Reisen dodged my gohei smash. That's ok though, I still have this!

I turn my body around to face Reisen's backside and fire my now finished yin-yang orb toward her.

It smashes against her backside and she stumbles in the air for a bit.

Follow up time though! I throw my gohei in combination at Reisen and as Reisen turns around...

**SMACK!**

Headshot! Yeah! That sure feels great when I hear that smack sound!

I can throw my gohei as many times as I want here since the space is enclosed so it won't get lost! I can use that to my advantage since it won't land anywhere else except in the hallways!

Reisen starts falling toward the ground with my gohei falling toward the floor with her as I land on the ground, safe from any pain.

Reisen isn't going to be safe though! Now's the perfect time to combo her!

I run up to her as she gets up and give her a knee to the head, making her fly back into the air.

Perfect!

Air combo time! I jump up into the air at the same altitude as her and prepare to punch her back on the ground with my fist but...

...Reisen recovers in the air by stopping in it and she fires off bullets toward me which I can't dodge.

Damn! AGH! The bullets scatter against my body and prick against me like needles.

OW OW OW OW!

I fall back onto the ground with a thud. That stung and hurt! Combo failed. Would've been nice if worked though. At least my compensation prize is that I get my gohei back since it's right next to me.

I slowly get back up to see Reisen hover in the air before declaring her spell card.

**"{Wave Sign "Mind Shaker"}"** I hear Reisen declare out in the hallway as she starts firing blue and red bullets in non stop waves.

The bullets are spread shots and the gaps look big enough to dodge so this looks easy enough.

I start toward the bullets to directly confront them, but...

Reisen's eyes turn red and I look at it for a split second before feeling really strange.

My mind feels like it's turned against me,

Huh?

What! What happened to all the bullets? Reisen's bullets just disappeared even though they were right in front of me moments ago!

Suddenly, the bullets that disappeared reappeared right in front of me! Huh?

I have no time to react as the bullets hit me from so many different areas and pain filled every one of them.

I fall to the ground on my knees and struggle against the onslaught of bullets until they finally disappear again..

What was that? Did the bullets just teleport? But that doesn't make any sense! It was only midway to me and it just popped up in front of me within a couple seconds! It must be her eyes!

Damn! No time to think! Here comes the next wave! Maybe I can predict the area where I can consider safe spots between the bullets! I can't see them but maybe I can guess where they're going to go!

Reisen's eyes turn red again and look at me and just like before, the bullets disappear out of my sight!

So it is her eyes that are doing it! I need another look at the pattern before finding out where the safe spots are though!

I run over in Reisen's direction a little and stop immediately.

Let's try here. It seems like a good spot and an area where the bullets won't scrape me.

The red and blue shots reappear in front of me however and I get completely barraged by the total onslaught as a mish-mash of red and blue collided against me.

NGGH!

Pain overwhelms me I struggle to stay strong against the continuous barrage of it. Eventually, it stops, but not without leaving some bruises on me.

Yukari finally finishes her side of the dodging with practically no scratch on her. Are you serious? The red eyes didn't even effect her? Or maybe she knew in the first place?

Yukari raises her hands and calls out...

**"{Shikigami "Ran Yakumo"}" **Yukari called out, and the same girl with the tails appears from a gap and charges out to Reisen.

Reisen immediately stops her spell card as she was scratched all over from the tailed girl though she stays in the air even though the tailed girl stop attacking her.

The girl flies back over to Yukari and waits next to her, probably awaiting her next order. Convenient. It must be nice to have someone attack for you rather than yourself.

So the girl that attacks for Yukari is a spell card? I didn't know summons could even be a spell card. She must be really powerful to be a spell card.

"Hello Reimu. It has been a while hasn't it?" The girl who attacked Reisen asks me with a kind voice.

Uh-oh, she's talking to me.

What's her name? Oh yeah! Ran! That's what Yukari called her during the spell card.

I'll have to improvise.

"Yes, it has been a while Ran. How has it been with Yukari?" I ask Ran stupidly, though it only thing I could think of.

"Yukari-sama is always sleeping during the day so Chen becomes quite bored often. The house duties falls on my shoulders sadly." Ran replied, with Yukari coming in between us.

"Interesting conversation! But it looks like that rabbit girl is going to attack isn't she?" Yukari replied, pointing out that Reisen was going to use a new spell card.

Oh. Thanks for the warning.

Doesn't Reisen look slightly ticked off for stopping her spell card.

**"{Lunatic Sign "Visionary Tuning"}" **Reisen announced as bullets appeared from her, showering the air with countless ones.

Diamond shapes of red and blue filled the hallway as they rapidly approached me with no way to dodge in between. I could only take steps back, but they were moving faster than I could move.

I... I can't find any openings! I prepare to brace myself against the relentless assault as Reisen's eyes turn red again and the bullets disappear again.

Wh-where did they go this time? I panic as to where to go as the entire hallway seemed clear of the threatening attack.

Too late! They reappear with almost no movement difference and continue onward toward me with no interferences.

On the other hand, I can't even see Yukari or Ran anymore because the field of bullets completely covered my view so I can't copy how they're dodging.

As my mind decided to freak out and panic on how to get pass the diamond field, my body somehow automatically starts moving out of my own commands.

What's my own body doing! I can't move! It's like someone's moving it for me!

_"Don't panic! If you panic, you're not going to focus or react right! I'll take care of this!"_ The voice told me, trying to calm me down from Reisen's seemingly unavoidable attack.

What? What do you mean take care of this? And how can I not panic!

Almost instantly after I questioned it, the divine feeling that once took me over during my first fight with Wriggle came back, and all my pain and feelings disappeared. My body moved completely on it's own will as I could feel my body take steps back to avoid the still seemingly impossible attack.

As Reisen's eyes turn red again, the bullets disappear, but no matter how much I wanted to panic, my mind would reject it and it would disappear back into me. I could feel myself moving in a diagonal direction upward and stop in an area, and as the bullets reappear, I was in the mass of bullets that surrounded me from all sides.

Whether it was the voice or divine being thats moving for me, I don't know, but I feel unstoppable with it though. Like I can do the impossible. Whatever's possessing me is doing an incredible job at doing what I couldn't. Avoid and survive through all the spell cards untouched.

I didn't question it before because I was at the end of the battle, but now, just what is doing this for me? Who's the voice that keeps warning me of whatever's coming up and how does it know?

After a while of moving in out of the disappearing bullets, my body started forming a yin-yang orb on it's own. However, the yin-yang orb didn't finish and I could practically feel it from my subconscious as the incompletely blue soul-like sphere launched toward Reisen.

The sphere blasted it's way right through the Visionary Tuning, sucking up whatever was in it's path, and eventually reaching Reisen herself. The sphere however, stayed in front of Reisen, despite that it could have hit her.

What is that voice planning to do?

It raises my arm out toward Reisen and another yin-yang orb forms in the palm of my hand though it forms almost instantly like I had done the attack many times. It even breaks the limit of the initial yin-yang orb and forms version 2 almost three times the speed I could have done it. None of my energy even got sapped from me. Version 2, done just like that.

Immediately after the forming, the orb shoots itself towards Reisen, crushing anything in it's path and it combined with the blue sphere, forming a white-blueish sort of fireball that lands squarely on Reisen.

It had a blue explosion, just like my Sanctifying Orb, though it wasn't as big and it didn't have a series of smaller explosions. Reisen still falls out of the sky down to the wood floor and the voice controlled me to run up to Reisen.

**"{Divine Arts "Wind God Kick"}"** I heard myself say as I felt myself flip kick Reisen into the air.

Twice, Three times I flip kick Reisen rapidly before my fourth one launched her higher into the air.

Immediately after, I followed up into the air with Reisen, giving her a final upper kick to her chin, making her fly higher into the air and onto the ceiling.

I land safely down before Reisen falls back down painfully after being stuck and thrashed onto the ceiling.

That...

...was incredible by all means. I didn't even know Reimu had a melee spell card like that!.

The divine feeling from me disappears and my pain quickly reenters me though it came back with twice the force I initially had. It was a slow cooling burn in my legs as well because of the Wind God Kick though the effects of it were much more better than the costs.

Reisen is completely down and shes even struggling to try and get back up from the solid melee spell card and the orb fireball that the voice used for me.

I pant for air from the stress that was supposed to be gone from whatever took over my body and made it disappear. It's like it just decides to ditch me to get away from the pain it knew it was going to cause to me.

Damn it! I just even feel even more tired than before!

At least now I have a new attack even though it was the voice who did it for me!

I'll call it... Yin-yang orb version 3: The Hakurei Searing Yin-Yang Orb.

I would call credit for it, but it's still Reimu attack altogether so I can't take credit for it. Sucks.

Reisen flies back into the air shaken up, probably because of the Wind God Kick the voice did for me.

Yukari is looking at me as if I just did something incredible for a rookie. Well yeah, that technically did happen. I knocked Reisen flat on her face with a new attack and a spell card. I'm not sure if I can do the spell card, but at least I gain a new attack.

Here comes the next spell card. I feel incredibly at ease though, even though the next spell card is probably more dangerous than the last one and the voice probably isn't going to help me again this way throughout this fight.

**"{Indolence "Mind Stopper"}**" Reisen barely calls out and several white support orbs fly out of her toward the outside of our make-shift hallway battlefield.

I turn back to see them firing off green bullets as well as red bullets and they surround me from all sides. I can't shoot the support orbs because I can't even see them in the giant mass of red and green that just fills my eyesight.

But there has to be a way to get through this. The voice was able to dodge Reisen's Visionary Tuning with no problem so I think I can too. I just have to stay calm and find out how to get through this.

I just, gotta think fast. I'm already tired as it is so taking minimal damage should be priority one. I should probably try Yin-Yang orb version 3 on Reisen, but I'll have to come up with a way to get closer.

Wait, I think I got it! Reisen's bullets disappear when she uses her eyes. I can probably move past all the bullets and still fire an incomplete orb to start up the Hakurei Searing Yin-Yang orb.

Why didn't I think of that earlier? It must be because I panicked.

And once again, the voice proves me wrong and gives it a good point.

If I did this before, I wouldn't have had to suffer so much.

Reisen's eyes are starting to turn red! This is my chance!

The are suddenly turns red and instead of the bullets disappearing, they stay in place frozen!

I run through the small gaps of bullets as fast as I can before Reisen decides to stop her lunatic eyes and charge up an incomplete yin-yang orb. It barely saps my energy as it wasn't complete.

Finally, the area turns back to normal and the bullets move normally again across the hallway, though I'm already in the clear under Reisen and throw the incomplete soul-like sphere at Reisen.

Just like how the voice did it, the sphere stays put near Reisen, probably waiting for something to hit it. Some of the bullets that happen to touch the unfinished orb just got dissipated completely as if it didn't even exist. No particles of energy at all.

It's time for Version 2! The big yin-yang orb! I charge up another yin-yang orb, breaking it's limit by boosting the energy rate that it would suck from me and it grows rapidly to a human-size orb.

Reisen finally notices that I'm below her and her shots start coming toward me. That's fine, you're too late to stop me now!

I send a quick surge of energy into my arm, solidifying the complete giant sphere, and send another quick energy surge to shoot it out toward Reisen.

Bullets that stood in the way of the of were simply deflected off to the side in another direction and the giant orb finally reached the floating firey blue substance while combining with it to form the same attack that the voice did.

A blue-white human sized searing yin-yang orb that could explode on contact. It lands against Reisen and explodes on her once again with the grenade-sized explosion.

Her attacks stop altogether as she falls out of the sky and back onto the wood floor once again. I can't use Wind God Kick to combo like the voice did, but I still can beat you down with melee!

However, as I run toward Reisen, she slowly gets up, raising one of her arms toward me and points her finger at me with a fake-gun fashion.

What's she doing?

I see Reisen mutter some words before firing off a thin red laser toward me from her finger! Oh no!

I'm going to get hit and I'm not going to stop fast enough to sidestep the laser!

A gap opens up in front of me, making the laser disappear into the unknown area that it contained, saving me more damage. That sure was a close one! Who knew how much power that laser had?

So Yukari finally decides to cover me with a gap to protect me? It's a bit late but I'll take any help I can get to prevent any form of damage.

Reisen flies back into the air off the ground, though some parts of her clothes are ripped up. Let's hope it doesn't get the chest area.

I'll end her here though with Sanctifying Orb! Reisen doesn't look any stronger than Marisa. Against Marisa, it blew up on her, but she practically came out almost unscathed and just fired off her Final Spark at me.

If Reisen is already losing parts of her clothes, there's no way the Sanctifying Orb won't be effective.

Ok, let's do it then. I'll wait until the hallway is full of bullets and so it can get it's maximum power.

**"{Spread Sign "Invisible Full Moon"}" **I heard Reisen announce as bullets appeared from her and shoots out in a circle fashion.

And once again, Reisen decides to use her lunatic eyes on me. The bullets don't freeze like they did with Mind Stopper. They disappear just like the first spell card I did against Reisen. Just like before as well, they reappear closer to me though not point-blank.

It's time to start! The familiar feeling of the spell card fills my hand and I feel my energy sap slowly from me. Is it me? Or is my energy usage getting small. I feel like I still have some to burn.

I start to feel light-headed, probably from getting tired though.

I better end this then.

If I'm too far away from Reisen, she'll dodge from Sanctifying Orb like Keine did. Yukari had to gap my orb that time.

Hmm. Since the bullets disappear, I can use that to my advantage and try to get as close as possible before firing the Sanctifying Orb for the finisher.

Right on time too, the bullets just disappeared! Here we go!

I sprint as fast as I can past the bullets and Reisen decides to stop her lunatic eyes.

Red and blue collided against me and I felt myself waning down slowly but surely from the continuous attack.

I feel my legs collapse on me about 3/4 of the way so this is it!

Go! **"{Holy Relic "Yin-Yang Sanctifying Orb"}" **I announce, sending the surge of energy to shoot out the holy relic toward Reisen.

Any bullet that come in contact with it, simply got absorbed and got used to make the orb bigger meaning more destruction.

Reisen uses Lunatic eyes and when she sees Holy Relic flying toward her, she panics and tries to fly away.

But it's too late!

**BOOOOOOOMMMMM!**

**BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!**

Ahh, the satisfying explosion of when the orb hits. It feels great.

Doesn't it look like the Holy Relic got weaker though? I think the explosion isn't as big. It could be because it didn't absorb enough bullets to reach that firepower, but at the same time, it's reasonable for the smaller energy usage.

I feel like I could fire a second one if I could.

Finally, Reisen flies out of the sky after the explosions stop and she lands on her back.

Guess it's my victory, again with help from the Voice and Yukari/Ran.

Yukari flies over to me though I don't see Ran with her. Guess I won't get a chat in with her.

Tough battle though, considering the voice had to go through one of the attacks for me and tell me to calm down when I was on the brink of going crazy because I panicked so much.

I think I'm just tired from energy usage than from getting hit so much like all the other times. Maybe I'm getting better? I hope so, otherwise I'll lose all my fights afterwards if I don't get any stronger.

Maybe this time, I won't have to have Yukari heal me since I'm mostly energy tired.

"So which way do you think we should go Reimu?" Yukari asks me, as I walk closer to Reisen.

Reisen's clothing on her shoulder area is burnt and gone and so is her bottom part of the suit. Lucky me, it didn't get her chest area.

Would have been nice...Hey wait, what the hell?

Urgh... I should keep that in control.

_"Hey, isn't that door over there weird?" _The voice who helped me against Reisen said.

Door? Oh that multi-colored one. Yeah it sure stands out compared to rest of the blue ones.

"Oh no.. I forgot to seal that one!" Reisen commented, proving any suspicions correct. All the more reason to go check it out though.

"I say we go in that door Yukari." I told her, pointing toward the multi-colored door that just screamed, 'Hey Eirin's in here.'

"Are you sure?" Yukari questioned me. Good reason so though since I'm not really Reimu once again.

"Well it's the only door that's really raising doubts right now so why not?" I answer Yukari, confirming her doubts.

"I suppose. Shall we go then?" Yukari replies, heading off to the rainbow door where I had pointed out.

"Oh no... Master will not be happy with me." I heard Reisen say before I join Yukari to go along into the door.

Well sucks for you then. I almost feel sorry for you, since you're got beat in battle and now Eirin is going to do something to you?

Almost only though, not quite there.

As I push open the multi-colored door, I see there's no floors.

Well that is just great. I still can't fly yet so I guess I'm useless now.

Or not... Yukari is walking in with no problems. I guess the floor is just invisible.

I put my feet in and... yup, it's solid. I guess it's safe after all.

I slowly walk inside the dark room that was only lit by the light given from pictures of a bamboo forest. There's sure alot of them too.

It's pretty much a hallway. How do you fit a hallway into a bigger hallway. This one even has no flooring, well I can't see it though.

Luckily, I still have my gohei because I didn't really use it against Reisen.

I really should thank that voice for that new attack too and to keep calm. I would have gone insane if I went on like that.

I slowly walk inside the dark room that was only lit by the light given from pictures of a bamboo forest. There's sure alot of them too.

It's pretty much a hallway. How do you fit a hallway into a bigger hallway. This one even has no flooring, well I can't see it though.

Now for that main question. Where the heck did Ran go? I talk to her for like 10 seconds and Yukari comes in, interrupts us, and shes gone right after. How?

The many wonders of Yukari. I wonder what else she has up that sleeve, err gap.

Hmm? There's someone up ahead. I can't quite see because she's pretty far away.

It looks like she's at the end of the hallway though. Is that the person who jacked the moon then? It's really not Eirin? All this time, I was convinced that it was her, but now...

Why would she have to take the moon away? I can't think of any reason of why she would take it. There's almost no personal gain from taking the moon from what I can see. Is it for someone else then?

Eirin comes out from near one of the pictures. There's still a girl up ahead though. So it really wasn't Eirin after all.

"Geez... I told her not to let them come this way..." Eirin said, referring to the defeated Reisen who forgot to seal the door we entered.

"Reimu did you hear what she said?" Yukari asked me, getting my attention to Eirin's words.

This is the way huh? Shoot though, Eirin is too strong as it is. There's no way we'll win unscathed and then survive against whoever's at the end over there.

We'll have to finish Eirin quick then!

Yukari only steps forward toward Eirin and stops in front of me.

"It has been a while Eirin." Yukari says to Eirin, showing me that she knew her from before.

Whoa what the heck? You know her? From where?

Eirin doesn't even respond as Yukari turns around to face me.

"I will deal with Eirin. You go on ahead and take care of whoever the perpetrator is Reimu." Yukari said to me, though I didn't process it right.

...

Wait, so you want me to take care of whoever took the real moon? Are you crazy! I understand that Eirin is tough and we have to get the moon back, but I can't win alone!

Whoever is over there is probably even tougher than Eirin! I'm not going to win unless I somehow pull a miracle and beat whoever's doing this but that's not going to happen!

What are you thinking Yukari!

Eirin rush fires us with rapid-fire blue bullets and Yukari defends us with a gap that shot out it's own purple bullets which lands against Eirin's and dispels each other. Definitely even terms.

Before I could even decide to help, Yukari gaps me behind Eirin and I land against the invisible floor only a few yards from the battle that would come.

**"{Medicine Sign "Galaxy in a pot"}"** I heard Eirin call and as she spawned several white support orbs which surrounded Yukari in a circle and started firing off an uncountable amount of bullets.

Aggh! They're all coming towards me and I can't get any closer to Yukari. Guess I don't have a choice. If I go back, I'll only get destroyed brutally by Eirin.

I start running towards the end of the hallway, sometimes turning back to see Yukari fight off Eirin with her own bullets and dodging through Eirin's. They were both firing off incredible amounts of bullets that I don't think I can ever hope to achieve.

So Yukari knows Eirin from somewhere? I don't get it.

As I start nearing the end of the hallway, I start to clearly see who the mysterious person is.

Long black hair dawned her with a pink gown that covered her upper half. A long red skirt that went down to her feet were on the bottom.

Behind her...was the full moon.

"So that's the real moon..." I said to myself, wondering how the gowned girl moved the moon over here.

"Yes, the true moon that is seen from the Earth." The girl says, commenting on my awe over the look of the real moon.

"Who are you?" I asked, preparing my fighting muscles in case the girl would decide to take shots at me while she was talking.

"My name is Kaguya Houraisan. You should introduce yourself first, but I'll let it pass." Kaguya said with a small smile on her face.

"But your friends were pretty hostile to me when I came in so should I really introduce myself first?" I replied, trying to counter her statement.

"Eirin hasn't let me out of the mansion recently so it has been a bore waiting here." Kaguya said, still keeping her smile though I wasn't too happy about it.

"A bore? I literally went through the toughest times of my life in one night because of you!" I exlclaimed, ticked off that she was just bored while I was getting killed from every other place on the way here.

You took the moon! How could you be bored because of that!

"You're so impatient. Don't worry, I will show you the power of my impossible requests and the power of the true moon!" Kaguya calmly said, despite my obvious anger against her.

"I haven't had a chance to go out and play with Mokou so I'll make it up with you." Kaguya says, probably taunting me as being a weakling.

Impossible requests? What are those?

And who's Mokou?

"Well, it looks like I got the moon back so even if I lose here, at least the incident is solved." I said, giving myself a sense of relief and calmness.

"Well it's too bad that you can't see it anywhere else but here." Kaguya said, shooting my relief out of the window and into the panic zone.

Seriously? You mean I have to beat her to get it back? I won't win though!

"Well? Are you ready?" Kaguya asked me, at least giving me some time to ease my mind a little bit.

Well that's nice, an 'honorable' opponent.

"No, not really." I said, hoping to buy more time so I would delay the inevitable fight.

"The five impossible requests that defeated so many humans in the past. How many can you fulfill?" Kaguya said before flying up into the air, probably to start her attack.

Probably none but I have to get through them all if I want to win.

It really is going to be impossible at my skill level. I don't even have any support since Yukari decided to go play the 'You go ahead and I'll stay behind' game with Eirin.

I don't have a choice though! Voice, I'm totally depending on you now.

Kaguya starts by firing off red and blue waves of diamond-shaped bullets that go back toward her before rapidly shooting themselves toward me like homing missles.

So all I have to do is just move a little from the homing bullets and it'll pass through me.

At first, I run through the small space that the homing bullets give me though it was easy if you could move fast enough to break and go back to the other direction.

But...

Oh no! I knew that attack was too easy for Kaguya! She's completely trapped me between the small gaps! If I move to the left or right, it's a long way down to pain and if I stand still, the bullets will home in on me anyway!

To make things worse, Kaguya starts firing off a bigger version of her diamond bullets and they shot directly at me. With no room to move, I just wait for the pain to come.

NGGH! AGGH! GAWK! OW! KAH!

They land against my chest with brute force, pushing me back flat on my back against the invisible floor.

That hurt! I didn't think it was power instead. It was red so I thought it would burn.

I slowly get back up using my gohei to stable myself and to ease the pain of getting back up. Despite Kaguya looking close to a noble or whatever, her bullets are really strong. These aren't even the giant circle shaped bullets that Mystia and Keine shot against me. I hope she doesn't have them.

**"{Impossible Request "Dragon's Necklace"}"** I hear Kaguya announce as one of the items she had floating around her float to the front of her.

A dragon's necklace? Oh yeah, that definitely seems impossible to get. But how does she even have it then? And why is it a spell card?

Urgh, no time! The item sucks in something before spewing out rainbow colored lasers and a variety of different colored bullet.

Within the span of a few seconds, lasers fill the entire area surrounding me and I now I know why this is an impossible request. There's almost no gaps that I can go through without getting touched by the lasers!

I'll try using the Searing Orb then to stop her! This better be worth it then!

I charge up an incomplete familiar soul-like blue sphere and quickly throw it at Kaguya while running from the incoming lasers. It somehow bypasses pass Kaguya's lasers and starts floating around where Kaguya was.

Unfortunately, since it bypasses the laser, it heads straight for me with nothing to protect me.

**SSSSSSSS! **

GAHHH! That burns! That laser is even worse than the one's Keine shot at me. Those ones burned but not like this!

I grab my left arm in pain to cover the red scald mark the multi-colored laser caused with my gohei still in hand.

Despite my new injury, Kaguya continues to assault me with non-stop laser barrage with more bullets to follow up. There's too many to count as I force myself to randomly move left and right between each of the small gaps.

Nggh! Even the aftereffect is painful! The burning won't stop at all!

I can even feel some of the lasers barely touching me and it still stings!

Is it me or is my incomplete orb starting to shimmer a bit? I almost forgot about it though. I'll make Kaguya explode!

I start charging up for a giant yin-yang orb in the palm of my left hand, easily breaking the first limit to form the yin-yang orb of my size.

Now I need a clear shot at Kaguya somehow without the lasers crushing my orb. It's strong, but with the damage the laser dishes out, I'm starting to doubt that it'll make it to the unfinished orb to make the searing orb.

Guess I'll have to charge through then! No pain, no gain!

I charge through the field of lasers as fast as I can, bearing any pain that Kaguya dealt to me whether it was a laser that skimmed past me or her rainbow bullets.

All right! I'm close enough! Take this!

I force energy into my arm and the giant yin-yang orb blasts off like a rocket toward Kaguya. Lasers land against the terrific sphere though they either get deflected off or dissipate. I guess I underestimated the sphere's powers after all.

As I was too busy looking at the orb, another laser lands against my leg and I fall to my knees to grab the scalded leg.

ARGH! I should have been more careful!

I look back up to see just in time as the yin-yang orb combine with the soul orb to create the Searing Orb and explode against Kaguya.

The giant blue explosion engulfs her completely though lasers still shoot despite the explosion.

Dang it! If that thing doesn't stop shooting, I'll just end up losing before the end of the requests!

Wait a moment! Maybe I don't have to do all her requests! If I end her here or knock her out, maybe this will be the only request I'll have to do! Their impossible requests so I don't need to see another one!

In that case, I'll use the Sanctifying Orb!

A sphere of blue forms in my hand as it saps my energy though it continues forming into the spell card I was going to end Kaguya with.

The lasers are still coming toward me but at least there's no personal bullets from Kaguya to worry about since Searing Orb hit her directly. They'll be the perfect amplifier to power up the Sanctifying Orb!

The smoke is starting to replace the blast radius that my Searing Orb blew up on.

Here we go! Please work!

**"{Holy Relic "Yin-Yang Sanctifying Orb"}"** I call out, proceeding to shoot the blue sphere outward toward the smoke.

The spell card drives right through the lasers, each one making it become bigger and bigger and eventually, it reached the smoke.

**BOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMM!**

**BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!**

The smoke is instantly blown away from the explosive power from the Sanctifying Orb with 4 more minor ones following it.

That's strange... I could have sworn that it was supposed to be much stronger than that. More firepower was added to it, yet it's still weaker than the first time I used it. Maybe it has to do with why I feel like I can shoot more Sanctifying Orbs.

Shoot! If that's the case though, then...

There might be a chance that the Sanctifying Orb might not be enough to stop her! I don't have another spell card though! That's my strongest attack besides the Searing Orb, but I can't keep doing that because she might figure out how to stop it!

My worse hope comes true as the explosion clears up and the smoke conceals a shadow of a person. Kaguya, no doubt.

Damn, I knew it was too good to be true...

Kaguya look likes she has some wound and minor burn marks on her, but other than that, she looks completely fine and still ready to fight!

I don't have anything else to use! Looks like it's up to my normal attacks then!

Or maybe not! I could try Wind God Kick!

The Voice did it so maybe I can too! Maybe it'll come with instincts or something!

First, I gotta have Kaguya come down somehow. It looks like she's starting her next impossible request.

**"{Impossible request "Buddha's Stone Bowl"}"** Kaguya cried out, replacing the dragon necklace with a stone bowl instead.

Impossible request number 2. 3 more after this though, plus I have no more spell cards or tricks up my sleeves that'll work.

Wait, what about Wind God Kick? I can try to use that, even though it seems nearly impossible to use correctly like the Voice did.

Kaguya launches a ton of white attack orbs in the shape of a half circle, well more of a bowl. It charges up for a laser and launches them all in my direction at random areas, making my room to move very limited.

Shoot, I can't even move more than a feet or I'll touch the laser! They look much more solid than the lasers from Dragon Necklace so they'll probably hurt much more too!

And is that red star bullets I'm seeing from Kaguya's area?

Great, this reminds me of the fight with Marisa where I got wiped out by the star bullets. Maybe if I just move slowly since the lasers aren't going to move!

Yup, it's working! It's hard, but I'm barely dodging the red star bullets because of the small room I have! I'm doing it! I just have to kind of move slow so to be careful not to touch the laser.

I duck from another bullet that whizzed past my head, thinking of a way to get either myself up to Kaguya to knock her down or to have her come down.

I can't shoot back with anything because the white orbs are in the way. Maybe I can try shooting them down slowly and make my way to Kaguya.

I prep up for a version 2 Yin-yang orb, which was a just a giant yin-yang orb, though the power was pretty strong.

I continue to dodge slowly from the oncoming star field while the lasers stopped every once in a while and fired again still giving me limited room to work with.

Ok it's ready. Here we go.

I blast off my giant yin-yang orb toward the white support orb in front of me that was still holding onto firing its laser. As usual, any bullets that hit my orb was deflected or destroyed. It crashes against the white orb and somehow, both of them just explode, with smoke covering my view.

The laser was gone. Is it gone? Did I destroy it?

The smoke slowly starts to clear up, but the white orb is still there! Mine's gone, but Kaguya's is still up there, and it fires another laser at me as if it was mocking me for my failure.

That didn't work. So the legend is true? The unbreakable stone bowl of the Buddha is really unbreakable? It even spreads out to the spell card!

Sucks...

Hmm. The smoke that the white orb makes when it collided with my yin-yang orb. It stopped the laser completely. Maybe I can run through past the white orb as the laser is stalled, then I can keep firing yin-yang orbs at the next white orbs and make my way to Kaguya!

That sounds like it'll work! I don't have any other choice since I already blew my only spell card during the first impossible request.

I charge up another giant yin-yang orb and slowly continue to dodge the red star bullets that just had no end to it.

Breaking the limit and still moving on.

All right this looks good. My turn to counterattack!

I shoot the yin-yang orb towards the white orb in front of me and proceed to sprint toward it as the yin-yang orb covered me.

On the way, I charge up another yin-yang orb in my left palm and continue running behind the first yin-yang orb until it crashes onto the white orb, stopping it completely with the ongoing smoke.

I run through the smoke and as I reach the end of it, another white orb fills my sight and I quickly fire another one to stop the next white orb to continue on moving.

Is that another white orb? Oh yeah it is. Well, I'll smack it aside then!

I swing my gohei as hard as I can and the white orb goes flying out of the formation of the bowl.

I decide to charge up another giant yin-yang orb in case there happened to be a fourth layer of the white orbs though I didn't see any.

Yes! I got past the white orbs! I'm in the clear!

I can even see Kaguya in plain sight in the air, with almost nothing to protect her!

Right on time too! My yin-yang orb just finished!

I fire my human-sized toward Kaguya, and as I watch it soar toward her, I charge up another one to fire against her.

Direct hit! Here's another one for good measures!

I launch the next yin-yang orb to knock Kaguya out of the air and repeatedly spam the yin-yang orbs continuously at Kaguya.

Finally, she falls out of the air from my non-stop barrage of my yin-yang orbs though I feel incredibly drained from all the orbs I fired.

I pick up another big of energy and rush toward Kaguya's falling body.

As I reach to her already downed body on the ground, I firmly plant my foot under her to...

**"{Divine Arts "Wind God Kick"}" **I call out, lifting my kick to perform the series of flip kicks against Kaguya.

One, two, three...

Four, damn it, I didn't kick her hard enough to fling her into the air.

Urg, all right then! If I can't finish her off with a kick, it's my weapon instead!

Gohei Smash!

I grip my gohei with both hands and slam it down against Kaguya like I was swinging a sword in a complete downward fashion.

Kaguya lands against the invisible ground brutally, even flying back up a bit before she kicks into the air, flying away from my second gohei smash.

At least it wasn't a complete failure. Wind God Kick, really is hard to do. So I have to put more power in the fourth kick to get enemies higher into the air.

Well I can't use Wind God Kick anymore since spell cards are 1 time uses in the battle until the next fight, but that's not going to happen since Kaguya is the final boss.

At least I found a way to stop the second impossible request.

The Buddha's stone bowl. I didn't even know it actually existed.

URGH! I instantly feel tired and my knees feel weak.

My adrenaline slowly disappeared as the fatigue finally set in, replacing it. I must have used too much version 2 yin-yang orbs against Kaguya. I lost count after my fifth one.

I must have shot maybe 8-10.

There's still 3 more Impossible Requests to do too!

Kaguya flies back into the air with more bruises on her though she still looks prepped to fight despite my attacks on her.

This doesn't bode well right now.

**"{Impossible Request "Robe of Fire Rat"}" **I hear Kaguya announce, replacing the stone bowl with a small robe.

Impossible request 3. Robe of the fire rat?

I've never heard of it before.

Flames completely surrounded the area around Kaguya with a giant circle of fire around her.

I can't even come up close anymore! That pretty much eliminates my melee attacks!

Flames spawn from from the outer ring of Kaguya's fire ring.

I can't even see Kaguya anymore!

Evasion time, I should get used to dodging this so I can think of a way of how to get past this impossible request.

There's too much! Some of them even combine to form even bigger flames which take up a bigger space, preventing me from trying to fit through any small gaps.

There's...there's no way to dodge it! There's a gap but I won't move fast enough to reach it!

"GAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!" I scream at the top of my voice as the incinerating burns left intense burn marks on my skin.

As the fires stop pounding onto me, I fall onto the ground with only pain and exhaustion in my veins and blood.

I slowly look up to see red lasers heading toward me.

I struggle to stand up, but too slow and tired to even attempt to move away from the lasers.

And they overwhelm me completely.

I don't even feel the pain anymore as I fall onto the ground slowly with the lasers assaulting me.

That was pathetic. What would Yukari say here?

A sense of peace filled me as my body laid flat on the ground.

Is this... what death feels like?

I question it as my mind barely hung onto the side of consciousness.

My eyes were still open, still trying to fight to stay open as long as they could before shutting down forever.

_"No! Get up! Don't knock yourself out!"_ The Voice said, trying to persuade me to force myself completely back into consciousness.

I wish I could, but this is almost unbearable. I feel at peace. Doesn't that show that I'm already at my limit to taking whatever is thrown at me?

_"Just pull yourself together! Do you want to die here!"_ The Voice forcefully asked, making me feel ridiculous.

No. Of course I don't want to die here...

Don't you see the circumstances though? I'm just too tired to fight on.

I've only gotten through 2 of the impossible requests. I still have 3 more to go.

I have no spell cards left and my own attacks drain my energy. I don't have an infinite amount of it.

I hear the voice just sigh. I wonder how.

"Before I die Voice, who or what are you anyway?" I ask it mentally and physically though very quietly.

Who am I kidding? I don't even deserve it's help anymore if I'm giving up this easily.

_"Who am I? I thought it was pretty obvious."_ The Voice replied to my question rather vaguely.

I mentally laugh at myself with that statement.

No, you made it too confusing and I never really thought about who you were.

Another sigh from the Voice. It sounds female-ish this time though.

_"I'm Reimu's intuition."_ The Voice said, though I can't really say it's a voice anymore now that I know what it is.

Intuition?

_"That's right. I'm her intuition."_ Reimu's intuition said, rather upset that I couldn't figure it out throughout the game.

I see...

In a way, it does make sense but it doesn't at the same time.

It makes sense because of how it was able to possess me and do all the incredible attacks and dodging with ease. Not to mention, tell me what's going to happen and the bad feeling.

It doesn't at the same time because now it seems like an entity of it's own. I don't think intuitions are supposed to be able to talk on their own and act on their own

How does it know I'm not Reimu?

_"Hmm. How should I explain this? Some people say that Reimu's intuition is so good, it was almost as if Reimu could predict the future and it was usually right. Basically, it was that strong. Because of that, I've been able to become a separate being, though attached to Reimu. She doesn't know though."_ Reimu's intuition tried explaining to me with me slowly understanding it.

So basically, you're your own thing because you were a powerful intuition able to help out Reimu in the first place.

_"In a way, yes."_ She said, clearing up my doubts about her.

So she's able to take control of me because she's strong enough to do so. This is the first time I've seen women's intuition become so strong.

Makes me admire them even more.

_"Akyris, as being part of Reimu, I cannot allow you to die here as that would kill the actual Reimu as well. I'm proud to be with Reimu. It's fun helping you too since Reimu sometimes bores me out because she's better at fighting. You're reliable and do your best, but you're troublesome at the same time. I'll help you though."_ The intuition says to me, giving me a sense of admiration toward it.

Yeah, you've given me total hope again.

What are we going to do though? I'm already too tired on my own to fight back against Kaguya.

Plus I'm already technically body unconscious.

_"I'll handle it. I'll continue helping you until Reimu comes back. It'd be stupid to let you die here after all your work wouldn't it?"_ She says, giving me determination that I could still beat Kaguya.

All right. I'll let you handle it then. I'm counting on you!

_"Have I ever failed to help you?"_ Reimu's intuition says, before disappearing to go help me in whatever way.

No I guess not.

My mind wanders off to go rejoin it's body with Reimu's intuition.

**_"{Flying Mysterious Shrine Maiden}"_** I hear her say before disappearing like her usual way.

That sounds like one weird spell card.

I'm counting on you Mrs. Intuition!

**POV CHANGE!**

* * *

**3rd Person POV**

Reimu's body flew into the air with her eyes closed as if someone was possessing her.

It was as if someone was lifting her to heaven, though she stopped at the same height as Kaguya.

Kaguya's attack stopped for a moment, only to resume launching fire from the circle of fire at Reimu.

Reimu however, doing what it seemed like nothing, spawned six ying orbs that surrounded her and spun around her, forming a protective barrier. They rotated around her at incredible speed and the fires that were to hit her, simply died away against the yin-yang orbs.

To retaliate against the fire, the orbs around Reimu fired white and purple charms which were basically purple and white square bullets that locked onto Kaguya and aimed toward her, though they only crashed into the ring of fire and just disappeared into thin air.

As if knowing what to do on how counter Kaguya's Robe of the Fire Rat Impossible Request, another yin-yang shoots from Reimu and pushes through the fire barrier, aiming toward Kaguya.

It crashes onto her directly and soon, more yin-yang orbs follow up to power through to Kaguya and stop her Impossible Request.

The power of these yin-yang orbs were immense as they were at most, 2x stronger than the Searing Orb.

The ring of fire disappeared from around Kaguya and the fires that were spouting from it disappeared as well.

"Hmm. How did she better all of a sudden?" Kaguya asked, before flying away farther from the unconscious body of Reimu.

Charms and amulets were rapidly fired from the 6 yin-yang orbs around Reimu and aimed toward Kaguya.

As that was happening, Reimu was shooting out red and purple square bullets from herself in a circle shape that spread out among the sky.

Kaguya could only block off Reimu's bullets with rainbow bullets of her own that only collided with each other and canceled each other out.

Indeed, it was a battle to behold from the moon princess and the unconscious shrine maiden whose body was possessed by a teenager boy.

Yin-yang orbs were canceled with giant circle bullets.

Charms and amulets were countered by the spontaneous rapid fire of multi-colored bullets.

Yukari looked over at the battle for a moment, giving a silent smile, before returning to her battle with Eirin.

**"{Impossible Request "Swallow's Cowrie Shell"}" **Kaguya called out, sending off teal and pink lasers with red star bullets surrounding the center.

The teal and pink lasers criss-crossed with each other around the sphere that was plain empty space.

Reimu, still unconscious, only hovered in the air in place as the yin-yang orbs simply protected her from the many lasers.

To retaliate, charms and amulets spawned from the yin-yang orbs, though they were burnt by the lasers and destroyed, leaving absolutely no trace of it.

The bicolored lasers slowly disappeared and instead, shot into the air in a different area, reaching out into the beautiful mimicry of the night sky.

Reimu only just waited for the lasers to disappear against the yin-yang orbs and counterattacked with her own danmaku bullets.

Kaguya was hit by them though not enough to stop her from continuing her impossible request.

Instead more bullets even more star bullets just spawned from her, aiming straight for Reimu.

However, unconscious as she was, she did not have to do anything besides a movement from the left to avoid the mass of bullets.

The yin-yang orbs continuously fired on and on with minor breaks in between each round of firing while Kaguya did the exact same.

Bullets countered bullets and lasers missed.

Eventually, Reimu flew closer to Kaguya at high speed with intention to collide against Kaguya.

The orbs rotated even faster, deflecting any incoming bullets from Kaguya while the teal and pink colored lasers couldn't even touch Reimu.

Reimu crashed onto against Kaguya and the yin-yang orbs repeatedly and forcefully smacked against her repeatedly.

Kaguya was forced to push back, however Reimu was unrelentless and fired off more danmaku bullets at her, hitting her squarely on every area of her continuously.

To end the the impossible request once and for all, Reimu launched her 6 yin-yang orbs that were defending her straight at at Kaguya which land brutally against her stomach.

Kaguya falls down out of the sky, but hovers barely above the ground to avoid the intense crash.

**POV CHANGE**

* * *

**Akyris/Reimu POV**

That...

was most definitely OP. That didn't even take that long.

How the heck did she do all this while Reimu was technically unconscious?

2 Impossible Requests taken down like nothing while I drained all my energy during my series of 2.

I guess I regained control of Reimu's body and it looks like I still have my gohei intact.

Nice!

As glad as I am to still be alive, I still feel really tired though not as bad as when I got nearly killed by the third impossible request.

It must because of Flying Mysterious Shrine Maiden.

_"Well I've mostly done my part. Good luck Reimu! Or should I say Akyris?"_ The intuition asks me, though I wonder what I should really be called.

I guess Reimu would be ok.

_"In that case, good luck Reimu!"_ She says before leaving me alone.

Something doesn't feel right...

Wait! I'm flying!

I'm still in the air and I'm not falling down to the ground!

I don't know how but I'm going to take full advantage of it! Maybe it's the side effect my Flying Mysterious Shrine Maiden.

Kaguya flies back into the air, looking somewhat angry at me for being able to take down 2 of her impossible requests so easily when I had so much trouble before.

So how do I move in the air? I should try to learn this while I still can before flying becomes a disadvantage instead of an advantage for me.

Maybe if I focus my energy on the bottom to accelerate myself?

...

Yeah it works. I'm moving, but pretty slow. If I get used to this though, this can probably help me a lot.

**"{Impossible Request "Hourai Barrage"}"** I hear Kaguya announce her last impossible request as this time, a branch with what it looks like some colored jewels on it appears in front of Kaguya.

It looks like a stick that just had danmaku stuck on it or something. If it's an impossible request though, I should be careful.

Multiple lines of lesser rainbow circle bullets launch themselves at me, keeping me trapped in between of the open gaps. Is she planning to shoot extra bullets at me while I'm pressured by the amount of bullets around me?

Kaguya fires off more rainbow bullets to her side and after flying off for a while, they start moving past the lines of bullets and toward me. It even looks like their tracking me .

I send energy into my legs and angle myself upward to struggle to fly up a bit to avoid the attacks from the sides. Unfortunately, they hit me from both sides and I get blasted out of the sky.

AGGH!

I fall out of the sky and start shooting towards the floor with nothing to break my fall.

Shoot! Come on! Float! Fly! Do something!

I send a version 2 yin-yang orb's worth of energy toward my back to cushion my fall or maybe even break it as I land against the ground.

I close my eyes, waiting for the oncoming pain to enter my back.

And it does.

The fall wasn't as hard as I thought though. I guess I can send energy to parts of my body to reinforce it or do other things. It's kind of the same method as making my yin-yang orbs though it's in the palms.

So what if I focus energy on my feet?

As I think though, another wave of tracking rainbow bullets are starting to shoot toward me!

Guess I gotta get moving again!

I slowly get back up from my fall and jump as high as I can before focusing as much energy as I can to boost myself higher into the air.

I just barely dodge the 2 sided rainbow barrage from my double jump, gained from pushing into the air and forcing energy into my feet.

So I can double jump if I push my feet down and force energy into it. Not bad, it'll help me.

It looks like it'll drain so much energy if I keep doing it though. It's a fat burst of energy so I guess it has to be dynamic and really fast.

I feel so much more tired all of a sudden too! Was it because of the after effects from Flying Mysterious Shrine Maiden?

Kaguya chooses the worst time to shoot off more tracking bullets as even more than the usual amount decides to follow me.

Urgh! No time! I gotta run!

I start running toward Kaguya as fast as I can, though the speed of the bullets slowly catches up to me.

I jump as high as I can and the bullets follow me as I leap into the air with all my strength.

I kick my legs out in front of me as hard as I can and burst out energy into my feet, propelling me backwards, away from the dangerous attack.

Ok! This is my chance! I'll double jump to Kaguya and stop her with a giant yin-yang orb! It's the only I can pierce a hole into her giant mass barrier!

I run as fast as I can, making sure to dodge any stray bullet that may stop me on my endearing move. I jump as high as I can and once I reach the maximum height of my first jump, I charge up for a giant yin-yang orb while forcing energy into my feet as fast as I can while kicking downwards to boost myself even higher toward Kaguya.

I extend my armed hand outwards at Kaguya, just as I finish materializing it into a solid object and shove it onto Kaguya as hard as I can.

She falls out of the sky as do I as I can no longer keep the orb intact.

I feel a final bout of pain as Kaguya lands next to me, looking unconscious.

I... I won!

I beat Kaguya Houraisan's impossible requests!

I had to have help from Reimu's intuition during 2 of them, but in combat, you do what you can to survive.

This is the final boss!

Fatigue only settled into me as my artificial energy source of adrenaline disappeared, but the relief of thinking that the fight was all over, comforted me.

I breath deeply to try and regain any lost energy that was used up against Kaguya and to catch my breath.

Something doesn't feel right though. I'm getting this really bad feeling.

What's happening? Did Yukari lose against Eirin or something?

That wasn't it though. Kaguya just started floating back into the air like she was an angel going back to heaven.

No... NO! NO! NO!

I have nothing left to stop her if she does another attack! My stamina is already empty and my spell cards are all used up!

"I see. So you're the one who stopped the night." Kaguya says, before raising her head to me with pure determination on her face.

Damn... She really is going to continue fighting. Please be weak!

"With my powers of manipulating eternity, I'll dispose of this everlasting night!" She says, before raising her arms, most likely for another attack.

**"{End of Imperishable Night -Midnight-}" **Kaguya called out, flying higher into the air.

I struggle to get up off of the ground, utterly hoping that her attack wouldn't be as strong as the impossible reqests.

Hope denied. Kaguya fires off what seems like an infinite amount of bullets with incredibly small gaps that I know I can't fit through.

Bullets criss-crossed each other with giant red circle bullets heading slowly, but directly toward me.

My legs completely felt like crumbling onto the ground from the pressure it felt.

_"Do I really have to save you again Reimu? So tiresome, having to help you 2 times now."_ I heard the intuition say to me.

Yeah sorry, but I'm completely helpless now.

_"Just hang on for a moment then. I'll pull something out for you to use."_ She says, before leaving me alone with Kaguya's attack to deal with.

Hang on huh?

In that case, maybe I can do it. I should mostly just get away from the giant red circle bullets. They'll for sure knock me out instantly if I get hit. Maybe a yin-yang orb to protect me from some of the minor bullets.

I don't know how long, but hopefully not long.

I slowly charge up for a version 2 yin-yang orb to defend myself against the minor bullets, while tiredly running away from the giant red bullets.

Some of the bullets collide onto me and I gradually get even more tired if that was even possible anymore.

After what seemed a long time, the orb finishes after I give up some more of my stamina to use a version 2 orb.

I take the time to quickly try and rest while my orb tanks any damage that I would have taken if the bullets had reached me.

However, as I sit in the same spot for too long, one of the giant red circles collide against my yin-yang orb, destroying each other, leaving me with nothing to protect myself again as I fly back from the force of it.

I land on my side, coughing, looking extremely pathetic as I was still barraged by Kaguya's bullets.

I don't even feel the pain anymore as my sense of touch was slowly lost.

At this point, even a weak youkai could kill me at this point.

Is that what Kaguya is going to do? Kill me?

She won't do that won't she?

Come on Intuition! Can't you see I'm not even capable of trying to defend myself anymore?

Either by a whim, or a miracle, Kaguya's attack stops though it doesn't seem she's going to stop it all here.

"The dawn will come immediately! With this, your Imperishable Night shall be broken!" Kaguya announces, completely confident that she would finish me off and the frozen night.

**"{End of Imperishable Night -Morning Star-}" **I hear her say, as she rose her arm and fired off countless forms of bullets.

Squares, circles, stars, you can name them all.

_"Ok, I'm ready! How about you? Are you up for this?"_ The intuition finally says, asking me whether I was ready to beat Kaguya once and for all.

I'm not really ready and I sure as hell am not up for this, but I have to.

_"Here we go then! Make it grand!"_ The intuition declared without my consent.

_**"{Dream Battle "Illusionary Moon"}"**_ She calls out in my mind, bringing 8 yin-yang orbs around me.

With every piece of my energy! I'll win then!

And I charge out to Kaguya with my almost depleted energy...

...

**Gensokyo: Hakurei Shrine**

...

The shrine got filled up really fast.

There's so many people here that I don't even know.

I have to keep serving tea to all the people. It's kind of frustrating. Plus all my dango got eaten so fast, I couldn't even get one for myself

Is this what Reimu does whenever a party occurs at her shrine? When I expected a party, I didn't mean this big.

There's a girl here that looks like she's already drunk here because of her non-stop sake drinking! It seems like the gourd that's in her mouth has some infinite amount of sake. I really shouldn't be this surprised though.

Then there's another girl with pink hair and a long blue kimono with a hat on her head. She's the one who ate half my dango in less than 10 seconds. Talk about a big mouth.

"Hey~! Reimu!" I hear a familiar cheerful voice behind me.

And what do you know? It's the humanized version of the death star. Marisa.

"So you finally solved the incident? That's why we're all here right?" Marisa asked, making some of my wounds react a bit for the memories of it.

"Yeah. It was really tiring, but I finally got it done." I replied, giving Marisa a small smile before offering her some tea on a tray.

She accepts it and walks off to Alice, though Alice doesn't seem to like Marisa too much.

What kind of relationship do these 2 have? Dog and cat?

She's not bad, naive at the worst and straightforward.

Her Master Spark might as well be the Touhou version of the kamehameha wave from Dragon Ball Z! Except it burns you all over and probably incinerates you to absolutely nothing. Same thing happened to Cell though so maybe not like that.

Well, what do you know?

It's the Eientei crew, though I don't see Tewi around. I wonder what's she doing.

Yukari is in along with them too. Might as well join along with the convos.

"Well hello there Reimu. Please, sit down." Yukari said, offering me a seat next to her.

And I do, sitting down next to Yukari with Ran next to her and Eirin plus Kaguya.

We engage in light conversation that really doesn't seem to fit the intensity of the battle.

This place is weird, though if it was all battle, it wouldn't be a fun world.

All of this just turns my thoughts off to my final spell card attack against Kaguya's and on how I got here after the battle.

* * *

**Flashback**

As I charge out toward Kaguya, I stop brace myself for the oncoming bullets that would have hit me. Fortunately, the rotating yin-yang orbs around me, block off any minor bullets that would have hit me.

Kaguya fires off 1 type of bullet each time before switching to another series after some time.

Butterfly bullets switched with giant light blue circle bullets. They in turn, are later replaced by small yellow stars and green bullets.

The yin-yang orbs are firing off their own bullets on their own so it must be the intuition that's shooting them.

They seem to shoot randomly at times and they don't launch immediately until a few seconds after being still.

So how am I going to go up close to Kaguya without having my bullets simply countering hers.

_"She's using the dawn for her attack right? We can use the moon for our attack too."_ Reimu's intuition said, though it left me confused.

Well how? What do you got in mind?

"_I'll amplify the orbs power with the moon. Kaguya just has too many bullets flying around and we can't shoot enough overpower huh. But we have the yin-yang orbs to protect us so we can block them off. There's not too many residents around here that can use up close combat very well."_ She said, giving me an idea of what to do.

So we should go up close and smash her with my gohei instead of just trying to outnumber her bullets?

_"Yes. Just go up maybe halfway to her and I'l power up the orbs for something new."_ She said, before leaving me alone yet again.

Seriously? I have to fly up there to get close though. It's already hard enough to perform a double jump, now I have to do it with low energy while dodging Kaguya's attack?

Wait, the orbs will block them for me and the bullets it's already firing should protect me. This better be worth it then.

I bend my legs to prepare myself for a super jump and...

Force about half of my remaining energy into my jump into the field of bullets as my protecting orbs fired bullets ahead of me and shielded me from any bullets.

As I reach the height of my first jump, I push my remaining energy for one last push in the air doing an air dash toward Kaguya.

_"Ok here we go! Combine!_" I hear the intuition say as she combines all the yin-yang orbs around me to the front one, creating a sphere the size of a house.

This was your big plan? A bigger version of a yin-yang orb than my version 2?

Oh wait, never mind. The giant orb is starting to fire off even more charms that the separate yin-yangs altogether.

_"Quick! Hit or shoot it to her before you lose your momentum in the air!_" She says, urging me to smack that ball to Kaguya once and for all.

So that's why you wanted me to jump.

All right! Epic Baseball Swing! Touhou Style!

**SMACK!**

There it goes! And what do you know, my gohei broke.

I just watch it soar off toward Kaguya and it completely knocks her toward the ground brutally. She even gets blasted by charms at point blank because it got too close and canceled her own bullets.

If she's out of the air though, I at least now know that it's over.

I feel my body fall to the ground with absolutely no form of support to break my fall.

And I land against it with the line of pain entering my back.

_"Well how do you feel now that you've won against Kaguya Houraisan?"_ Reimu's intuition asks me, probably having a smirk on her face if she had one.

I feel like I broke all my bones and then ran as fast as I could for about an hour.

Overall, this sucks. I may have won, but I feel like this wasn't worth it at all.

You even made me break my gohei to smack that giant rainbow colored yin-yang orb.

"Well Akyris. It looks like you had quite a time with Kaguya." A voice comes from behind me.

Yukari's face hovers over mine though she is standing with a parasol.

Wait, does that mean that she beat Eirin?

"What happened to Eirin? Did you beat her?" I asked with slight fear in my voice that Eirin was still able to fight.

"You can say I did. It looks like the real moon is at last, back." Yukari answered, noting the now gone moon from the sky.

Hmm. Well, incident solved finally. After 6 gruesome fights, it's finally over.

I cannot wait to just go back and sleep in my world.

So what happens now that it's over? Maybe I just wait for the ending now?

"So now what do we do now Yukari?" I ask her, curious of what to do now that the problem was solved.

She thinks for a while before looking like she had a good idea. Lightbulb should be over her head.

"Well..." Yukari says.

* * *

**Flashback End**

So Yukari's great idea to end all this tension between the Eientei people and us was to have a party at the shrine...

You didn't even ask for my permission or anything.

I still wonder how Reimu deals with this...

"Tomorrow is going to be a full moon." Kaguya said, probably referring to something I didn't know.

"Yes it will. Do you have something in mind princess?" Eirin asked, giving a small confused look of why Kaguya would mind the full moon.

Yeah, what would you possibly have for us? Another battle?

"Are you interested in a trial of guts?" Kaguya asked, giving me a slight smile. It just gives me a slight shiver down my spine.

"A trial of guts?" Yukari replied, slightly interested on what she had to say.

Oh no...

"That sounds rather interesting." Yukari added, giving me a glance.

She better not drag me into this.

"If you are going to go, you should go in a 2-person team like what you did when you fought me. This way, we can increase your chances to live and make it easier to find you." Kaguya said, most likely refering to Yukari and I.

"What~? A trial of guts? Doesn't that sound like fun Alice?" Marisa said, popping up beside me with a mischievious smile on her face.

You're going to join too?

"I wouldn't mind coming along though it is with Marisa..." Alice said, walking up next to me.

You too Alice?

"Hey... don't be like that Alice! We'll make a great team!" Marisa exclaimed postively, slightly stinging me with it.

And Alice only sighs in response to that. I would too if I was her and I didn't exactly like her too much.

"So where's it going to be?" Marisa asked, eager to know the location of the trial of guts.

"It will be at the bamboo forest at midnight. The thrill there of being scared is wonderful!" Kaguya answered, happy that she would enter the trial.

Sounds like a terrible place to be at when it's nighttime. Never know if monsters could pop up or something.

It wouldn't be called a trial of guts then if it was at a not so scary place.

"You're coming along too, right Reimu?" Marisa asked me with a grin on her face.

Oh shoot. No no no no no. Time to bail myself out.

"No. It doesn't sound too interesting." I said, hoping that she wouldn't push me along.

"Waahh, a trial of guts Reimu? You should go do it!" A slurred voice comes from behind me.

And I only have a moment before someone puts their arm onto my shoulder.

It's the drunken horned girl from before. How the heck is she still up from all the drinking she did?

And why are you supporting for me to go?

"No thanks." I quickly reply, pushing the girl's arms away from my shoulder.

"Come on Reimu! It'll be fun!" Marisa says to me while shaking my arm.

This is a really bad position to be in. I'm surrounded by people who can most definitely kill me but have smiles on their faces to conceal it.

Wait, I have an idea to satisfy them.

"Ok how about this? I have something to do tomorrow morning. If I don't get done by night, I won't go. If I do, I'll go." I said, hoping that the ladies would take the bait.

I might disappear in the morning and go back to my world since this is the end of the incident.

If not, I have no idea what to do afterwards. I hope I'll go back though.

"That sounds all right then! I'll go with Alice and you go with Yukari!" Marisa said, giving a fat thumbs up to Alice.

Alice just seems to ignore it, and walks off into the shrine.

This stinks...

If I don't end up at home tomorrow, I'll have to go back to the bamboo forest for a so called trial.

There's no reward so what the heck.

Well, since I'm here. I might as well drink today and worry tomorrow! I don't think a little sake will kill me!

Maybe I should even try talking to some of the people here. Should be good to know their names.

I don't know how long I'll be here since I'm already done with the incident so I might as well enjoy what there is until I can go home.

It's gonna be a long night. I'll just take whatever joy there is here though and just enjoy myself.

* * *

**Author's note: Well, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. What do you think will happen? I had to use the impossible requests instead of the divine treasures to fit the scenario so I hope you don't mind too much if I didn't make Kaguya strong enough. Now that break is here, I got more time on my hands! Please R/R! They're always nice!**


	7. Incident 1: Imperishable Night Part 5

**A.N: I finally got this done! I feel so proud of myself for finishing this! I worked really hard on this so I hope you guys enjoy this! If not, uhh I tried. Maybe you don't want to read this so go on right ahead!**

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**Gensokyo: Bamboo Forest of the Lost**

"Heya Reimu!" Marisa shouted, while waving her arm at me as I was walking toward the entrance of the bamboo forest where Eientei was located in.

Yukari was next to me as she walked with me with a parasol covering her from the moonlit night. Indeed, the moon was full tonight just as Kaguya had said.

Turns out that it isn't over after all. I thought I would disappear since the party was supposed to be the ending, but I guess not.

Yukari showed up at the shrine about sunset time to pick me up to do the trial of guts with me. She didn't question why I didn't disappear yet so I'm wondering about that.

I just waited at the shrine for almost the whole day without anything to do except clean the mess that everyone made. That drunken girl with the horns slept on the floor and I could barely sleep because of her. I said this in my mind several times but really, how the hell does Reimu deal with all this?

The party just left the praying shrine looking like a junk shrine within the span of what... 7 hours? If I'm ever Reimu again, I'm gonna try not to ever have parties like this.

Back on mind topic though, there must be something that I'm missing from the game. But what?

Wait. There was an extra option that I couldn't access on the main menu of Imperishable Night.

Could that be it?

Let's see. There was the main game obviously, the options, the spell practice, stage practice, Music room, and exit.

What's the option that can't be picked then?

Ack! The group is starting to leave me. Wait up for me guys!

I run after them to catch up to them and enter the dark pits of the bamboo forest.

Marisa and Alice were talking to each oher. Mostly just Marisa pestering Alice though.

"You seem to haven't disappeared yet Akyris." Yukari said, while walking next to me.

I just questioned that myself moments ago. Did you read my mind or something?

"Yeah. I personally don't know why myself. I'm hoping that I will soon and that it just takes time." I reply, hoping that Yukari wouldn't stop helping me here.

If this keeps up to me staying here, will I ever be able to fix that gap in my world then?

"I almost forgot. How did you beat Eirin?" I asked Yukari, wondering how she had beaten Eirin single-handedly.

"Hmm? Eirin?" Yukari asked dumbly, though I knew she screwing around.

Who else would I be refering to?

"I defeated her by doing the usual." Yukari answered, not giving me a clear answer on how she beat Eirin.

...

You know, if you don't want to answer, you can just say you don't want to say anything or just ignore me. I'm still wondering how you beat her though, maybe even pull some tips from it to fight better and keep myself alive.

I still need to figure out how to fly though. The aftereffects of Flying Mysterious Shrine Maiden gave me a glimpse of how it worked but the moment I got hit, I lost it all so I couldn't really figure it out.

I managed to get my double jump from it which is probably my most reliable form of movement in the air for now until I can learn how to fly somehow.

If I can, maybe even a new form of attack would be useful. All I still have are my attacks that revolve around the yin-yang orbs. My spell card, my version 2 and even my Searing Orb. I only have 1 spell card that's a melee but I couldn't use it right against Kaguya so without continuous usage of it, I won't be able to master it.

_"You know, Wind God Kick is technically mine since I used it first."_ Reimu's intuition decided to comment on it.

That's true. But hey, let me use it! I need every attack that I can get!

Also, all my orbs have a short time span in between each firing so I may give the opponent too much leniency to shoot me. I improved the time I think than the first time I shot it so it cuts the time span down a little but I need quick shots too.

Sometimes, openings in the opponent's attacks are very sudden and I might not be able to get a yin-yang orb in so I need any form of bullet that can be shot with almost no cooldown or anything between the attacks.

I'm not even going to bother shooting those puny bullets anymore. If they didn't even work against Wriggle, no way they're going to work against anybody.

I really hope that practicing works at home because I really could use it right now.

Well, maybe I won't have to fight since I got 3 other people with me. Marisa's a cheerful witch that looks like she has no shame and Alice is doll girl but they're powerful, no doubt. Yukari, I think that's self-explanatory but she's got border power at her fingertips. I don't want to mess with that.

Besides, who the hell would be out in the forest in the middle of the night anyway? I mean, we are out, but mostly because Kaguya pretty much got Marisa and Alice into it and I got pressured into doing it.

"I've been waiting for you..." I heard a voice from the nearby bamboo trees on the left.

I jinxed it. This sucks.

A girl in green flies out from the thick bamboo thickets and into the front of us. She has horns along her head with a red ribbon attached to it.

Is that Keine? What are you doing out here? Don't tell me Kaguya got you to come out for the trial of guts too!

What's with the horns by the way? Are you a human that goes into demon form at the full moon or something? A werewolf maybe?

Actually, erase that thought. That's just scary.

By the way, how long have you been waiting for us?

"You have a lot of guts, challenging me on a night with the full moon." Keine said, sounding confident that she would beat all 4 of us.

No it's us 4 versus you Keine. Yukari and I already beat you with just us 2, why do you think you're going to win with 4 of us this time? You're probably stronger, but you're not going to win. And why do you want to fight us?

"Good thing we're on a trial of guts anyway ze~!" Marisa responded, sounding happy that a fight would ensue.

I'm counting on you then Marisa!

"You won't lay a single finger on her!" Keine said, before flying higher into the air away from us.

Marisa jumps onto her broom and flies off into the air while Alice just flew up into the air with her.

Guess I'm on the ground with Yukari then.

**"{Past "Old History"}** I hear Keine announce her first spell card.

Her first spell card already?

"Crusaders, come." I hear Alice say as 4 dolls appear as she opens her book with 2 of them carrying a sword and the other 2 carrying lances.

4 white orbs appear in front of Keine as if protecting her and start firing off continuous waves of blue bullets that scatter around the entire area.

Marisa starts countering by firing her variety colored star shaped bullets which cancel out some of Keine's bullets. Alice weaves her way in and out of the bullets, flying closer toward Keine each wave that she dodges.

And where the heck is Yukari? Are you off eating popcorn again?

Before I can even start to think of a strategy as to what to do, red wave bullets, similar to the ones from Mystia, shoot out rapidly toward Alice and Marisa while I'm still stuck on the ground.

Some of the dolls get shot though they don't blow apart like I expect it to. No instead, they start attacking the bullets, defending Alice altogether.

Marisa is swinging her broom around while firing off her own bullets rapidly.

Maybe I can grab a shot from her behind. Keine seems focused on Marisa and Alice only so a surprise attack could work here with a double jump.

I just gotta wait maybe for a perfect chance and probably get through the remaining bullets that aren't stopped by them.

I just notice now but, I don't have my gohei to use at all. Yukari isn't around to send me another one to I'm down to my fists and kicks of fury.

Now to just sneak out to the back...

As I walk off to the back, Alice is finally nearing Keine and sends out another doll to the front of her to fire off bullets.

Ok, over here looks like a good set-up. Now to just wait.

Alice looks like she gets the sign because she nods at me and points her right hand out toward the doll shooting out the bullets.

**"{Magic Sign "Artful Sacrifice"}** Alice calls out, though I can barely just hear her.

The shooting doll just stops shooting and starts turning into a whitish-yellow color and flies out toward Keine.

**BOOM!**

The doll blows up at point-blank range in front of Keine and she's flung back in my general direction.

Perfect! Here I go!

I jump as high as I can while charging up for a giant yin-yang orb or a version 2, toward Keine.

I burst energy into my feet to boost myself upward to Keine and I finish the orb midway to Keine.

**BAM!**

I shove it against her back as hard as I can and she boosts forward back to Alice.

I fall back to the ground and I land roughly as my feet stumble a bit from my landing.

Alice's doll crusaders poke and stab against Keine and as they finish, they fly out of the way as Alice moves them away.

To follow up, Marisa rams herself at high speed against Keine and past her while on her broom.

Triple team! Alice and Marisa sure look like they work well together even if Alice doesn't seem to like Marisa too much.

However, even with our combined efforts, Keine manages to stay in the air, looking upset at me that I pushed her to get ganked by my allies.

Tch, she did get stronger with the full moon. I don't see any wound marks or anything on her! Kaguya wasn't kidding when she said that it was a trial of guts.

I can see why she seemed so confident before we started. Her spell cards look even more beefed up than the one's I had to fight against.

And it looks like her next one is coming up. I'm getting pretty good at telling if a spell card is coming up now. Or maybe it's just the intuition again.

_"Give yourself some credit. I'm helping you, but you're making your way through this too."_ She said, before just suddenly disappearing into whatever she into.

Maybe, but I wouldn't have lasted this far if it wasn't for you.

**{"Reincarnation "Returning-Bridge Ichijo"}" **Keine shouts out into the sky, flying back so that I was in front of her.

What is she planning to do? Where's all the bullets?

_"Behind you! Look out behind you!" _I hear the Intuition say before I turn my head over my shoulder.

****! Too late!

I get barraged from behind as the wave of bullets sting against my back and as I recover from the attack, a giant circle bullet rams itself into me from the front and I get knocked onto the ground flat on my back.

I slowly lift myself up and cough for getting the wind knocked out of me.

Ow...

I feel like I just got ran over by a truck and shoved off to the side onto a wall.

I get back up onto my feet and see that there is no way to stop Keine. She's completely surrounded from the bullets and only a solid hit that can pierce through her bullets.

Or, my spell card can just stop her! Sanctifying Orb, you're up!

Just have to hope that someone else will take out Keine if she survives my attack though.

I prepare the Sanctifying Orb in my hand while bracing myself from the bullets from behind.

I continuously fumble from time to time, losing some power on my spell card though I still stay away from the giant circle bullets.

Ok it's ready! Eat this you... Werewolf!

**"{Holy Relic "Yin-yang Sanctifying Orb"}"** I call out, before shooting it toward Keine.

At her bullets come toward Keine and stop there, the moment my spell card touches that, it'll grow gigantic and blow up Keine with massive proportions! If we're lucky, it may stop her here, especially if Marisa or Alice decide to follow up on that!

The best part is, it doesn't even look like Keine can dodge my attack because she can't see it due to her own attacks.

The Holy Relic soars into Keine's surrounding bullets and absorbs it all into itself, becoming the size of a house and exploding on contact with Keine.

**BOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMM!**

**BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!**

The familiar blue explosions fill the skies with some of the bamboos being blown away from the sheer power of it. Bullets fade into nothingness and Marisa and Alice block or dodge the remaining bullets surrounding them that weren't caught in the area of explosion.

As the explosion stops and the smoke clears, I see Keine fall out of the sky this time. Looks like the spell card was enough to stop her.

This time, Marisa flies straight for Keine onto the ground.

As she lands, she runs toward her and wields her broom with 2 hands and...

...Uppercuts her back into the air with it , ending with a smash on her.

Shorybroomken? That's what I'm thinking at this moment. When did Marisa ever learn uppercutting with a weapon?

Alice rushes down as well and outstretches her hand toward Keine, which sends the lance and sword wielding dolls to attack Keine.

Keine just blocks them off with her arms somehow, boosting herself away from the ground before flying back into the air.

Buff indeed. I hurt her to stop her spell card, but it only looks like I didn't even inflict any kind of damage on her!

Once again though, it would have been a nice follow up if Keine didn't somehow block the doll attacks and fly away back into the air.

Well, I only have one spell card left and I don't think I can use any of my attacks while she's that tough so I'm counting on you guys this time!

**"{Future "Next History"}" **Keine announced, spawning the same blue bullets, slower however, from her Old History.

I can definitely see the resemblance. Same blue bullets she used the first time and the same amount of support orbs that's there.

The red bullets however, this time, were much bigger and much more rapid than the Old History version.

There's too many of them! I'm starting to panic again!

OW OW OW OW OW!

I get rapidly shot everywhere on me as I fail to find a gap fast enough.

**"{Border Sign "Quadruple barrier"}" **I hear a spell card announce from next to me.

A purple box surrounds me and the bullets that were to hit me, dissipated inside the box.

Phew... Yukari comes to my rescue.

"You're late! And where were you!" I shout into the sky, upset that Yukari was having a fun time watching the fight unfold.

"Oh? I thought you would be able to survive on your own." Yukari says, opening a gap next to me and peering her head out of it with her hand holding a popcorn bag.

Oh you HAVE to be kidding me. You were having a fun time eating your troubles away while Marisa, Alice, and I were doing all your dirty work!

And now you decide to help me? You're innocent grin is making me feel any better! I give up trying to figure out how your mind works.

No time though, this could be an opportunity!

Let's try the Searing Orb. I have enough time to do it while the border is still up.

I send power into the palm of my right hand, waiting it to gain a decent size before stopping to form the incomplete sphere.

This should bypass through all the bullets no matter what.

I throw it toward Keine and quickly form a giant yin-yang orb to follow up and send it after it's predecessor.

The complete orb dissipates most of the bullets and collides with the orb that was half it's size to form the Searing Orb.

I jump up after the orb as it covers me from the bullets, intending to grab and throw her onto the ground.

The Searing Orb explodes onto Keine, creating smoke right after the explosion which I double jump into.

Now where is she? Oh there she is!

Crap! I jumped too high! Then I'll use her as a jumping stool!

I step on Keine's head and push myself forward, boosting myself out of the smoke with Keine being pushed into the opposite direction.

Wait, why did I do that? Now I'm going to fall!

"I got her ze!" I hear Marisa exclaim, bringing out a familiar wooden item.

Huh? Is she really going to...

**"{Love Sign "Master Spark"}"** I hear Marisa say, making me panic in the air as I flap my arms to push me away from Keine.

Not good! I burst energy into my legs and angle myself downwards so push myself to aim towards the ground like missles crashing against the ground, desperate to stay away from the Master Spark.

When it comes to power though, Marisa could probably win with this! If this doesn't work against Keine, nothing probably can.

I crash onto the ground hard as I hear the familiar **Hmm** noise when Marisa fires her Master Spark.

The pure power of it shook the air much more than my Sanctifying Orb and the giant beam erupted from the wooden object that Marisa was holding.

As I get up and turn my head around, I see Keine get engulfed by the Master Spark completely.

Yukari just walks up next to me while Alice stays in place, away from the Master Spark blast.

Finally, the Master Spark disappears and Keine looks completely toast.

There's black marks on some parts of her body while some parts of her clothes are gone. Luckily, not in any revealing areas.

She falls to the ground, looking unconscious with no sign of threat from her. She lands next to me with her eyes closed, looking completely harmless.

She's not dead though, that's what matters. Or she doesn't look dead cause it looks like she's breathing.

And with that, looks like the fight is over with a victory on our side. A big sigh of relief escaped me as I stared at Keine.

...

So what are we going to do with Keine now though? Just leave her here?

Well, I'm sure she can take care of herself. It's still a full moon and she won't die that easily, will she?

I nearly went to the pits of death when I came in contact with the Master Spark and Keine takes it on with just some burns. I just hope I don't ever have to fight Keine like this again. She's too tough for her own good. Then again, that refers to many residents here.

And Marisa flies back down along with Alice, looking pretty happy at the job she just did.

"Well that's done!" Marisa said happily, putting her wooden object back into wherever she put it.

And you prove my point of you being the humanized version of the death star from Star Wars.

That is pure power. My beefed up Sanctifying Orb only stopped Keine and your Master Spark just knocked her out of commission. Don't worry Keine, I feel for you.

Just looking at Keine makes my fall injuries react in pain. Yukari, I could really use your border healing right about now.

You're not going to do that though are you?

You know, now that I think about it, why isn't Marisa questioning my fighting ability?

Alice is looking at me strangely so maybe she's caught on already but not Marisa. Should I call myself lucky?

Also, does this mark the end of the trial of guts? Can we go back now?

"Come on! Let's go in deeper!" Marisa says, walking into the bamboo forest with no sense of fear.

Guess not. Don't you feel guilty that you shot down Keine at all? Especially with your Master Spark?

Your radiance of naivety is really killing me here too.

Before we go deeper, I see Yukari perform her border healing on Keine before walking with me as I was following Alice and Marisa deeper into the bamboo forest.

Don't you guys even care that you knocked someone unconscious?

I feel guilty for knocking out Keine like that though and just leaving her there. Sure, she shot us first, but she also misassumed that we were out to go hurt whoever she referred to.

By the way, is it me, or does it feel like the bamboos are trying to lead me away from Alice and Marisa? It is way too late in the night for this.

At least I'm not out here alone though, despite that I don't even want to be here.

I continue to gaze at Alice and Marisa, wondering how the heck they work so well together even though Alice isn't too happy about teaming up with Marsa.

So why don't you guys tell me why are we leaving Keine alone and going deeper inside the evil looking forest?

_"This could be your way out. After all, you said you were supposed to go home after the incident. This trial of guts could be part of the incident. It's the day of a full moon so it can't be coincidental."_ Reimu's intuition said,

Sadly, that's a possibility isn't it?

I sign a breath of exhaustion as I continue following, wondering if I would ever be able to go home.

What do you think of all this Intuition?

_"It's only natural if you want to go home. You are in a foreign world where you know almost absolutely nothing about and what could happen here. Reimu's been doing this for a long time."_ She answered, giving her advice to me.

I should really do my research later when I get home...

_"Research?"_ She said, confused on what I meant on research on this world.

Forget about what I said. I'm just talking to myself again.

_"Whatever you say."_ She replied, deciding not to mind what I said about research.

So is anything else going to happen in this trial? Or is it going to be another fight because all I've seen since I've been here besides the first day I was here, was fights.

Yukari said I was learning the attacks and movement rapidly though I don't feel like it. I'm pretty lucky I'm barely scraping through battles.

I may not to be able to use Reimu in the future incidents so maybe I shouldn't adjust to Reimu.

Jack of all trades, best of none. That would be useful here. I don't think I would be able to master everyone that is able to be used anyway.

Hmm?

"Why are you guys out here? Don't you know it's foolish of people to go out on a night like this?" I hear a voice from a nearby bamboo thicket.

She comes out from the nearby bamboos, walking out with her hands in her pockets.

She had what look liked long white hair that went down to her feet, though if you looked close enough, it was a very light violet color. It seems like it could be a blanket for her if she leaned back. Her pants were red with some papers on them which I don't understand what for. The strap on it went up to her shoulders and she had a white long-sleeve shirt.

Overall, her appearance makes her look least feminine than the other girls I've seen.

Are you talking about us? You look human too.

"We're on a trial of guts!" Marisa said happily to the girl in front of us.

Marisa! You're not helping! You're only making her think that we're foolish!

"A trial of guts? I never realized humans were this foolish. A trial of guts on a full moon, in a place where all the youkais are running around. I'm surprised you haven't been eaten by youkais yet!" The girl exclaimed, widening her eyes out toward us, probably thinking we were stupid at this point.

"Man, this wasn't even my idea. How did I get dragged into Kaguya's stupid trial..." I quietly said to myself, though Mokou seems to have heard it.

"What's that? Kaguya?" She replied, and I see her eyes close for a second before opening again.

Oh crap, she heard me. I think I triggered a nerve.

"I thought your trial was rather suspicious. So it was Kaguya who sent you after me. Why does she keep doing this even though it's impossible!" The girl directed it to us and herself as her face turned to anger.

Uh-oh, I don't think this girl likes Kaguya too much. What do you mean it's impossible to kill you?

Alice's eyes widen as she seems to have caught something. Smart girl uhh youkai.

"She's invincible. She'll survive even if we kill her." Alice said to our group, as we turn to her in surprise.

Invincible? As in... can't die? When did Touhou ever have cheat codes attached to it?

"So are you a zombie then?" Marisa said, gasping as if she struck something gold.

I just mentally facepalm myself as I hear the term 'zombie'. Where did you get something like that?

Alice just sighs and facepalms herself physically with her free hand. Glad you agree with me.

The girl on the other hand, just looks at us strangely. I'm on your side with that too.

"What...zombie?" I hear her say, questioning Marisa's intelligence.

Oh well, nice way to ease tension maybe?

"Well, you can't die right? Doesn't that make you a zombie?" Marisa says, trying to explain herself.

I'm sure that this doesn't apply to her Marisa, sorry. Nice try though.

"No! I'm a human who can't age or die. Don't you get it?" The girl says, sighing at our false stupidity.

That's basically the invincibility cheat code. That sucks.

"It seems like this girl likes her invincibility doesn't she?" Yukari finally decided to comment, only giving a close eyed soft smile at me.

Maybe. Kind of hard to tell.

"It's been a while since I've fought any assassins. If Kaguya sent you here, you must be here to try and kill me right?" The girl asked, before taking her hands out of her pocket.

"No, we just happened to come across you. That's all." I answered, trying to avoid a fight.

Whatever happened to diplomatic means.

"If you don't fight back, you'll fail your 'trial of guts.' It's a full moon battle at 2 A.M. Prepare yourself!" She said before jumping back yards from us.

"Wait wait wait, can't you think about this? Aren't you thinking wrong?" I panicked, waving my hands in front of her as I tried to stop her from fighting us.

Just my luck. Another fight. Against a person who can't die!

Wait a minute. Kaguya mentioned something like this I think.

She said that she didn't have a chance to play with Mokou because she was cooped up at Eientei. Could this be her? It sounds pretty obscure because then Kaguya's meaning of playing would be pretty stupid. This girl knows Kaguya though and doesn't seem to like her too much.

So then is the real reason Kaguya sent us out on a trial of guts was to kill this Mokou? She says that she's invincible though so why would Kaguya do it? Was this why Keine was trying to stop us?

The girl I think is Mokou flies into the air and shoots out square shaped bullets of 3 different colors in waves with a 3 winged pinwheel pattern. Blue, red and purple were shot out toward us in a tight formation before creating small gaps in between. She stops shooting for about a second then shoots again so there is another gap up ahead.

Ok you know what? Just to make things easier for myself, I'm just going to call her that since I don't want to think of another name right now.

One thing though, she sure shoots a ****ton of bullets without any support orbs to help her.

Alice and Marisa take off into the sky and fly into the rain of bullets until I lost sight of them. Crazy ladies.

This seems easy enough to get through. Something I gotta get first though.

"Yukari~! Can I have a gohei?" I turn around to ask Yukari, trying to give her my best pout face and even putting my hands together.

**BONK**

My gohei did not just spawn itself from behind me from Yukari's gap and hit me on the back of my head.

I turn around to grab my gohei from the ground, feeling my confidence enter me as I grip my gohei firmly with my right hand.

So she's invincible. Even then, we should be able to knock her out and end this stupid trial. It can't possibly get any harder than the cheat code girl.

So how should we start off?

I don't want to use Sanctifying Orb too early since there isn't enough bullets going on. Wind God Kick won't work because I can't find a way to get her out of the air. She looks way too high for me to reach up to her, even with double jump.

Evasion tactics then! It doesn't look like it's hard to dodge so here we go.

Left slightly... okay now a little to the right. Ok maybe I can blast her with one of my orbs while she stops shooting. Or wait, actually... I have an idea.

As I move through the bullets, I start to form the giant yin-yang orb in my hand, and once the bullets had stopped momentarily, I fire it off, jumping along behind the orb as it gave me cover.

I charge up another orb and as soon as I reach the height of my jump, I reach my arms forward and push myself up as the orb gave me my boost to climb higher closer to Mokou.

Once the next set of bullets come, I shoot off the now completed giant orb and follow up behind it just like my first orb as it blocks off any bullets that would hit me.

I finally push off the second orb and keep my face up to Mokou as my orb falls back down.

This looks close enough, I can use my double jump here and ram into her.

I push as much energy as I can to my feet and stretch my body out, forming a human missle and collide directly onto Mokou's stomach. I can feel her chest heave forward.

Her body is fricking strong though. My head hurts from that.

I grab onto Mokou in hopes of dragging her down but...

**SSSSS!**

AGGH! MY ARMS! WHAT THE HECK WAS THAT!

I instantly let go of Mokou and start falling back down to the ground, seeing that Mokou seems to have grown wings of fire.

Wings of fire? Moltres reference? Or wait, maybe it's a phoenix.

Marisa catches me with her broom and flies down lower to the ground to probably let me off.

"Thanks Marisa, I appreciate it." I thanked Marisa for her breaking my fall to the ground. She gives me a confused look as if I did something that was incredible.

What's that look for? Is it a rare occurrence to hear Reimu say thanks or something?

"No problem Reimu!" Marisa shouts to me before flying back into the air to stay in the battle with Mokou.

As I look back into the air, I see Mokou extend one of her arms toward me, most likely to target me with something.

Well just bring it on. I won't get burned by your wings this time.

**"{Limiting Edict "Ihakasa's Moon Curse"}" **I hear Mokou call out, shooting rapid green bullets in yet, another pinwheel pattern that spun to the right.

It looks similar to Marisa's Stardust Reverie since it's not really leaving me any open gaps to go in between and she's shooting out blue bullets toward me that looks like the edge of a sword from the western Europe area.

The gap is too small for me to fit through so I'll have to make my own.

I form another yin-yang orb and move along the flow of bullets, making sure to stay away from the blue pointed bullets .

As soon as it finishes, I force myself against the flow of bullets and use the orb to dissipate maybe 2 or 3 of the green bullets, making my own hole to fit through and going through it without any harm.

Easy enough. So I just have to take out a couple of the green bullets so I can fit through them and just stay away from the blue pointed bullets.

_"Look out behind you!"_ I hear the intuition warn me, and I turn around to see that the blue sword-tipped bullets were now red and were coming back toward me in the direction back to Mokou.

Oh no! Not again!

I duck as the red bullets pass over my head and I turn left shoot my normal yin-yang orb at the next wave of green bullets and rush through the open gap.

That was a close one. I owe it to the intuition again.

_"No trouble at all."_ I hear her say to me as I give her an incredibly quiet internal form of thanks after she finishes.

This seems like an easy spell card if you know how to dodge. I've still got plenty of power to rev up, but I still don't think I should use my spell card yet.

I'll leave it to the ladies then. I'm sure they can take this on.

But I feel pathetic, having to leave an easy attack to them when I should be finding a way to fight back against it.

**"{Shikigami "Ran Yakumo"}" **I hear Yukari call out off from the side, opening a gap a couple of feet in front of Mokou.

The nine-tailed human looking fox rushes out quickly from the gap, carving up Mokou nicely with her scratches all over her, leaving some of it on her clothes.

Mokou stops her spell card and flies off toward Ran who only disappears back into the gap as Mokou only stops in the air to see that Ran just retreated to wherever she came from through the gap.

Mokou really doesn't look too happy now does she? I wouldn't either if I got scratched all over.

She flies back into her original position of where she had activated Limiting Edict and her wings of fire just seem to grow even bigger with the flames more brighter as well.

Hey if you make it burn any more intense and someone touches it, you're going to give someone some serious third-degree burns.

She raises her hands into the air then points it towards Yukari before calling out her spell card.

**"{Immortal "Fire Bird –Flying Phoenix-"}" **Before spreading out red narrow oval shaped bullets in a circle.

A phoenix? I see. The embodiment of rebirth. It would explain the fire wings on her back and the reason that she's invincible.

Yukari only moves off to the side a little bit to dodge the incoming red bullets until a phoenix forms in front of Mokou and shoots off toward Yukari's direction.

Whoa what the… Mokou can control the phoenix? I swear ZUN got this idea from the Final Fantasy series seeing as one of the summons is a phoenix. Maybe.

As Yukari spins off to the side in the air to avoid being burned or hit, smaller forms of the red bullets were left behind during the phoenix's flight to aim at Yukari. However, the small red pellets were frozen in air, not doing anything at all.

Mokou unleashes another phoenix to fly off toward Yukari, leaving the same smaller bullets as the previous phoenix. They remain frozen in air, but the first set of bullets finally moved in the direction that it was mainly facing.

Once it's over, the red narrow oval shaped bullets return though more rapidly and plentiful in the same pattern as she had initially shot.

Yukari just spins and waltzes past the barrage of bullets, making sure to stay out of the path of the phoenix that would shoot toward her every once in a while.

I really wish I was as good as her. This girl is the dodge master, there is almost no doubt.

I can almost say the same as Alice and Marisa, but it doesn't look like their being attacked at all. Why isn't Mokou attacking all of us at once though. She has to be stronger than this or maybe as strong as Kaguya if she considers her a play buddy.

I have to find a way to stop her from launching phoenixes. Embodiment of immortality or not, we should still be able to force her unconscious with enough attacks.

Master Spark could just leave Mokou dead but she would revive with what I would assume back to full health so I don't think that would work out. Maybe I can get Marisa to tune down the power of Master Spark if that's actually possible.

Maybe she has a weaker version of the Master Spark. That might work. It should stop that blasted phoenix and stop her spell card. We could even combo her after the attack. This is all saying that she actually has something weaker than the Master Spark.

How will I get her to do it though? I can't call her down here to use the attack. Marisa looks like she's too absorbed into the fight to listen to me. Alice will get through to her for me then?

Lucky me. It looks like she just landed back onto the grass. I jog up to Alice to tell her of my plan to stop Mokou's flaming phoenix barrage.

She nods and flies back up to Marisa right up next to her and calls for her attention. I can't hear their voices because their too far up but it looks like Marisa seems to get the plan since she looks at me and nods with that big smile on her face.

Ok! It looks like she's got the plan.

Wait, I don't have a signal! I forgot about giving Marisa a signal of when to fire!

Marisa flies to the back of Mokou and extends her arm out with her palm in the direction of Mokou.

I'm not ready yet though!

Marisa fires out a hand sized blue colored laser that could really go for a mini Kamehameha Wave if it was bigger.

Mokou doesn't seem to notice it until the blue beam hits her back, forcing her to stop her attack against Yukari and pushing her down toward the ground.

As the laser stops, Mokou manages to stay in the air and turns her head over behind to Marisa to give her a glare.

Marisa just rubs the back of her head before Alice flies in front of her with a doll in front of her as well, only to have the doll unleash a rainbow beam about the size of the itself which collides into Mokou, making her fire wings disappear as well.

She gets blasted back into my area and I run to the area where she would supposedly land at as fast as I can.

Now what to do here... Oh I got it!

Flip kick!

I release it a bit too early as my feet only just barely touch Mokou's shirt.

Too early! Maybe this instead!

I surge energy into my feet similar to what I do when I double jump and I can feel the air crack against Mokou as she launches in an arc shape rather than back up into the air.

Just as she is about to land onto the ground, a tree stops her from moving any further and leaving some pain on her back.

Did I knock her out? I didn't exactly land the best kick on her since I would have missed if I didn't burst energy right there.

Nope, guess not. She's getting back up and once she does with her head down, the fire wings sprout from her back again. That's what I get for getting my hopes up.

Mokou raises her head up to me with a glare that would shoot out fire toward me out of her eyes if that was possible. This could be a move from Mokou. Fire Glare!

_"How did you get that idea? There's plenty of others that have a glare worse than that." _The Intuition decides to cut in into my thinking moment.

Really? We could name attacks after them too.

No I won't really do that.

Mokou flies back up into the air, making sure that our whole group was in sight, maybe meaning that she would be more aware of her surroundings.

Good idea, I'll be sure to backstab you sometime when you least expect it on one of your attacks.

**"{Fujiwara "Flaw of Forgiving Shrine"}" **I hear Mokou call out her 3rd spell card.

The first thought that runs through my mind about this attack. You have a shrine?

So are you an immortal shrine maiden too?

A shrine for phoenixes maybe? Hmmmmm.

Just asking, well thinking, what is your flaw then?

Blue square bullets start spawning from Mokou as they move rapidly in a formation, forming some shapes that I could barely see. Purple square bullets also join it's fellow blue ones as they move in my direction.

Diamonds, parallelograms, and other various shapes were formed with small gaps in between each of them.

Our whole group is forced to dodge all of the oncoming bullets and it looks like there's no chance for a back attack or sneak attack this time.

You really got us here Mokou.

The gap between the square bullets is small, but if I time it right, I can probably fit through without getting hurt. Just in case, I'll even form a yin-yang orb if the gap is too small or I make a mistake.

I start to form the yin-yang orb and as the bullets finally enter my danger area, it finishes as I prepare to evade the field of bullets.

Ok, go through the left gap and...

_"Back attack! Look out behind you!"_ The Intuition warned me from another attack from my backside.

From the back?

I turn around to see bullets that I thought dodged earlier come back from behind me from the ground.

I just barely turn around and shoot my yin-yang orb at the oncoming bullets from behind me to stop the bullets that would hit me. How am I going to dodge both wave of bullets from the front and the back?

I can try countering one side of bullets with consecutive orb fire, but if I do that, I may end up wasting stamina throughout any upcoming spell cards.

Should I try Searing Orb on her then?

No. I don't think that would work out either. If she specializes in the phoenix form of attacks, she has to have good use of fire as I saw before, even giving herself wings of fire.

I can't dodge both sides though. Not without getting hit or shooting another orb to defend myself.

Should I try to rush up there and sock her back down to the ground? I'll take a few hits but it's better than sitting here and wasting my time.

I turn back around to face Mokou and jump up as high as I can and brace myself for the oncoming bullets.

They scatter against my body, making me flinch in pain as I still rise higher into the air toward Mokou.

Nggh! I can't take this!

The force is too much and I fall back down towards the ground, closing my eyes, ready to take on the pain that would invade my body.

...?

The pain isn't here yet?

I open my eyes to see that I'm still falling through the air? So I'm not on the ground yet? I remember the ground being much closer than this.

I turn my head over my shoulder... Only to see that I was falling down towards Mokou's backside!

Gaaaahh! NO NO NO NO NO NO! NOT THE FIRE WINGS!

**BONK! SSSSSSS!  
**

I crash right onto the top of Mokou and we both start falling down through the air back to the ground.

Mokou pushes me off of her before flying back higher in the air while I still fall down like a rock.

Whyyyyyyyyy!

Wait, I still have my double jump! I'll just use that to break my fall!

I tilt my body upwards so that my feet were pointed to the ground and as I almost crash land, I burst the energy and push my feet outwards to propel myself backwards.

And a safe land rather than the crash land.

So who was the one who made me crash onto Mokou? Was that you Yukari? Your smile is only making you more suspicious, you little weasel!

At least it stopped Mokou from her Flaw of Forgiving Shrine. I'll give Yukari credit for that one.

Couldn't you have found another way to stop her instead of using me? That burnt and make me panic, or were you just aiming for that for kicks?

Someday and somehow, I swear, I will get revenge on you yet Yukari!

But not right now. Phoenix girl looks like she wants to kill me. Hopefully I'll see you in a later game and beat the crap out of you!

**"{Deathless "Xu Fu's Dimension"}" **Mokou activates as her wings seem to burn even more intense.

Blue square bullets shoot from Mokou from the front, back, left, and right side of her, forming a Nazi sign, before launching themselves at me.

Everybody is forced to dodge the huge area that Mokou's spell card, either going higher into the air or lower to stay away from the onslaught of attacks.

Urgh, All the gaps between the blue bullets are too small for me to fit through! Yin-Yang Orb Protection then!

I form the yin-yang orb as fast as I can and as soon as the blue bullets leave the formation to fire toward our group, red square bullets replace them and I start to panic on how I was going to get through all of the bullets.

_"Behind you again!"_ I hear the intuition call as I look behind me to see the same red square bullets!

Another back attack! Are you getting that from us?

I rush toward the wave of blue square bullets that were rapidly approaching me and I cover myself with my yin-yang orb, then turn around to shoot the relic toward the red side, leaving me a clear gap to run through.

However, as I run back against the wave of red bullets, something hits me from behind and I stumble to the ground, rolling over a couple of times until I laid flat on my stomach.

Damn... She got me there. A back attack with another back attack chained.

**"{Magic Sign "Stardust Reverie"}" **I heard Marisa's cheerful voice call out as the familiar veil of rainbow stars that countered against Mokou's dimension.

Countless colorful small stars weaved themselves around Marisa, swirling around in a circle, forming a sort of barrier around her while some of them were launched towards Mokou's own attack.

As some of them collided against each other, they cancel each other out with no one gaining the upper hand on each other.

I slowly stand back up as Marisa's attack occupied Mokou's attention, trying to think of a way to now end this stalemate of Marisa's and Mokou's spell card duel.

Ok, with this many bullets in the entire frield, this looks like a pretty good time to use the Sanctifying Orb. There's a ton of bullets coming from both sides so the Sanctifying Orb should be incredibly buff from absorbing Marisa and Mokou's bullets and blow the crap out of Mokou if it hits.

I outstretch my arm towards Mokou and start to form the Sanctifying Orb in the palm of my hand, trying to find the most bullet densed area to easily make it stronger and do more damage against Mokou.

Ok this looks good. Take this Mokou!

**"{Holy Relic "Yin-Yang Sanctifying Orb"}"** I call out, before shooting the semi-complete orb towards Mokou.

Bullets, each from Marisa's and Mokou's were absorbed into my Sanctifying Orb, easily making it into almost 2 times the size of my giant yin-yang orb.

Mokou's eyes look like they turn into fear before the Sanctifying Orb explodes onto her, taking in some of the remaining bullets that she had shot, leaving nothing in it's place.

Marisa stops her attack as she and the other watch the giant blue and white explosion envelop the area around Mokou followed by the chain of smaller explosions.

Direct hit! This looks like this would be a killer to Mokou!

Smoke finally replaces the explosions, but no body falls from the smoked area. She's still up in the air then?

Impatience slowly fills me as I anxiously wait to see what happen to Mokou after my spell card.

The smoke clears up and I can see a figure in it. Mokou. No doubt.

It is her. But it looks like she's incredibly beaten up from my beefed up spell card. Maybe she'll give up now?

**"{Forgiveness "Honest Man's Death"}" **Mokou activates, shooting out long streams of blue bullets with now way out, leaving me trapped in the middle of the attack.

Dark red bullets shoot out as well inside the huge area that the lines of bullets left, leaving no gaps again for me to go through.

I follow along the traffic of red bullets that they were pushing me into and suddenly Mokou unleashes a blue laser on the far right side of her attack.

The laser moves in a half circle shape, with nothing to stop it's path.

Shoot! I have nothing to protect me against the laser!

I raise my arms instinctually to stupidly protect me from it, waiting for the stinging or burning pain to come.

Instead, the laser passes right through me, leaving no mark whatsoever on me.

What the...the laser didn't do anything to me at all. What's the laser for then? A scare tactic maybe?

Clever.

If the laser is harmless, I just have to follow the direction of the dark red bullets and make an orb to pass through the continuous blue stream of bullets.

As the laser comes back for it's second time, I completely only focus on the smaller bullets, ignoring the laser that was swinging like a pendulum.

...Only to get stung and burnt by it as it passes through my body.

WAAAGH!

I flinch over in pain as a thick horizontal line of red covered my stomach area with the everlasting searing pain that came with it.

What happenened! I thought the laser was just something that didn't work!

Why did it hit me this time! It didn't hit me before! Does that mean that Mokou can manipulate the laser to whether it can do damage to the target?

Seeing as I have no way out, I can't do anything against this spell card. Serves me right for letting my guard down on it.

The best I can do is just lessen the damage done to me by letting one of my yin-yang orbs take some of the force.

Alice looks like she just got scraped by a few bullets from the looks of her flinching, but the laser that wounded me is just blocked off by one of her crusader dolls with a shield.

Marisa, I can just barely see her from the speck of black amongst all the bright blue bullets and the dark red. She stops for a moment, a hit maybe? And she's back on the move.

As for Yukari, why do I even bother trying to find her? During the other fights, I couldn't even find her half the time so I'm starting to think that it's just pointless to even look for her.

Wait, maybe I can just angle myself behind Alice so that the doll can block the laser for me! I just have to push my way through all the intense firepower that Mokou is spouting out.

That might work. I don't have enough time for the next cover so I'll just have to resist some of the laser power.

I quickly form the yin-yang orb version 2 as to lessen the inevitable blow that the laser would cause.

As the laser finally decides to move, I hold out the yin-yang orb in front of me, bracing myself for the oncoming impact.

Sure enough, the orb starts cracking and it breaks, leaving my arm to get punished for having it stuck out like a needle.

GAAAAHHH! BURN BURN BURN!

My hand just gets scalded from it, and I just hold my left arm with my gohei gripped arm, looking at the new wound that Mokou just caused.

I try to ignore some of the new pain sensation and form another yin-yang orb in my scalded hand, with difficulty because of the pain.

Did that orb even help at all? It doesn't even look like it at all.

This is my chance to move. I just have to get behind Alice as her doll is still able to defend her from the evil beam. She's probably the safest spot on the battlefield right now besides the sidelines.

**"{Puppeteer Sign "Maiden's Bunraku"}" **I hear Alice shout into the air, and I stop all movement as I turn my face up toward her and Mokou.

The crusader dolls scatter as a red sphere appears in front of Alice, spewing out red lasers while a couple of non-crusader other dolls shoot out smaller forms of the circle bullets, being just red and blue.

Mokou's bullets are relentless however, and the mini circle bullets are all but wiped out by the blue sweeping laser from her.

Alice's lasers destroy some of Mokou's formationed bullets and without her own bullets to counter Mokou's, Alice gets forced to stop her own spell card to put some dolls in front of her to fire the same rainbow laser that she did earlier.

Crusader shield dolls block off any of the bullets that would hit Alice while the laser continues to move on towards Mokou at a high speed.

Is that a doll I see in front of the laser? What's she going to do with the up-front doll?

As soon as Alice's laser crashes onto Mokou's, the doll flies off toward Mokou with it's arms open. It latches onto Mokou's legs and starts flashing a yellow-whitish color.

**"{Magic Sign "Artful Sacrifice"}" **Alice calls out, activating the doll on Mokou's leg to explode, engulfing Mokou completely and stopping the laser plus any more of her bullets that were keeping us contained in narrow spaces.

Some of Alice's dolls disappear but the crusader dolls stay in place, releasing their defensive position, but still looking like they were ready to shield Alice from any harm.

Alice looks pretty tired from performing 2 consecutive spell cards in a row while commanding every single doll to block any oncoming attacks. I better do something so Alice won't have to do as much, otherwise we'll lose a member of our group and probably our smart one besides Yukari.

Yukari, you're smart but I don't think you would perform a household chore at all. I can never tell what the heck you're thinking. Best not to take any chances.

Finally, the smoke is starting to clear up and it's time to see whether Mokou is still up for a fight!

As the smoke really does clear up, Mokou charges out of the smoke with her fire wings still intact towards Alice with incredible speed!

"Look out!" I warn Alice and she jerks her head up back toward Mokou to see Mokou charging toward her from the air.

She quickly attempts to assemble the shield dolls in front of her though a little too slow as Mokou slams right through them and right onto Alice.

Alice gets rammed into on the sides of her hip area, spinning her out of control in the air in the opposite direction. Brutal.

Mokou stops in mid-air once Alice spins out of control and flies off to continue her assault on Alice...

POW!

"Gotcha ze!" Marisa says as she intercepts Mokou by crashing right onto Mokou while riding on her broom, stopping her in her path and sending her flying back away from the direction she was flying toward.

Nice save Marisa!

And to add up to her save, Marisa catches Alice into her arms.

...? Was that just me, or did Alice just smile at that catch?

Nah. I must have been hit too much.

Alice gets off out of Marisa's arms and starts to fly in the air once again, but not before turning back and nodding, probably thanking her for the save.

Mokou stops spinning through the air and flies back higher into it, doing the obvious thing again.

**"{Hollow Giant "Woo"} **I hear from Mokou, half expecting a giant made out of bullets to appear.

3 lines of small teal bullets start forming in the direction of Marisa with equal gap in each one.

They start to scatter around the entire fighting area and Marisa starts to easily stay away from them.

More lines of the small bullets though with a purple color start forming in Marisa's direction and scatter as well. As that repeats, finally, the entire field is full of small bullets, leaving almost no escape path.

To solve that problem though, Alice just has her shield dolls block the minor bullets off, allowing her to fly through them harmless while Marisa just shoots out a giant green star that dissipates the smaller bullets, letting her do the same thing as Alice.

And Yukari... I still can't find her.

I'll do the same as Marisa and move through the bullets by forming my own gaps.

So I do, shooting my version of a big bullet, the yin-yang orb, and move through the area just as easily.

As I continue to wave through all the bullets, I see a gap open up behind Mokou. A familiar one with eyes in it and ribbons attached on the ends of it.

I'm not hallucinating to see that right?

_"I don't think you were hallucinating either times when you saw Alice give a smile to Marisa when she caught her." _The Intuition decided to input her comment.

You sure? I was sure that Alice wasn't too friendly on Marisa.

"They just have some strange moments. I don't really mind them too much. Same goes for Reimu usually." The Intuition tells me, giving me the impression that she really didn't care too much for Alice or Marisa. Actually, I take that back. I don't think she does.

Yukari's gap spews out bullets and they all crash against Mokou's back, though not stopping her attack. In fact, it looks like it didn't even faze Mokou at all since she just turns around just as the gap decides to disappear into thin air.

Mokou turns back around to face me and shoots out a phoenix bird at me which I don't react fast enough to dodge. The searing pain burns against my body and I fly backwards to land against the grass which eases my crash a bit.

Yukari finally flies into the adrenaline rushed action and starts spinning into the field of bullets, making her movements look like dancing in the sky while moving upwards.

Urgh... Tender spot on my hand.

I slowly recover from the rush phoenix charge that Mokou dealt to me and get back up off the grass just in time to see Yukari activate one of her spell cards.

**"{Sinister Spirits "Double Black Death Butterfly"}" **Yukari activates, spewing out 2 kinds of bullets at a rapid speed.

First were the dark blue and red butterfly shaped bullets.

The second was the teal and red arrow tipped bullets that were following along the butterfly bullets.

They all quickly spread around the area, leaving very little room to maneuver around.

Yukari's spell card bullets sometimes cancels Mokou's own bullets, however, sometimes Yukari's bullets overpower Mokou's.

Mokou is flying around at a rapid speed, still being able to fire her spell card attack to rain upon us.

She's too fast for me to shoot down and even if I do, the entire sky area is filled with too many obstacles for me to shoot.

I don't think Mokou is looking at her back again. This could be a good sneak attack from behind actually.

I won't have any support from the others since they're all busy staying away from the entire fire fight that Yukari and Mokou are having.

I don't blame them. I don't think I would want to fly in that entire mass of bullets.

Now to just sneak off to the back.

As I do that, Marisa finally looks like she's had enough and wants to unleash her own side of the bullets to join in on the action with Yukari and Mokou's spell card.

**"{Love Sign "Non-Directional Laser"}" **Marisa decides to call out as the same spell card that she used on me during the incident.

The lasers spread out among themselves and fire in different directions, rotating around Marisa while her rainbow star bullets were joining in along with Yukari's and Mokou's.

Her bullets were fewer than Yukari's but bigger and quickly took out many of the smaller units, leaving me some open room to fire.

Mokou is still furious in her spell card, even though her own doesn't match up to the other clashing spell cards from Yukari and Marisa.

No teamwork involved between Yukari and Marisa. No wonder they're not making any progress.

I guess Yukari's smartness and Marisa's straightforwardness just doesn't work well together. Shouldn't that apply to Marisa and Alice too then?

Oh, I'm finally at Mokou's back area. Now to think on what to do.

Grabbing her back, no way. I'm not trying that again.

Just grab her leg then? Sounds better.

Just have to time my jump so I don't get shot from any stray bullets from Yukari or Marisa.

I peak jump into the air, twisting myself and trying to move my body to dodge any oncoming bullets.

Argh! I can't dodge that one! Might as well use it now!

I double jump higher into the air and grab onto Mokou's leg and she looks down at me.

I wave at her face and she looks annoyed. Too bad for you since I'm going to do this.

I desperately grab the hem of her red pants and struggle to climb up.

The toughness of her pants is tested to the limits to hold myself up and I finally get a good leverage to sock her.

MIKO PUNCH!

I shove my fist into her stomach as hard as I can and she bends over my head, making me lose my grip on her.

Desperate to grab anything, I grab onto one of those charms on her pants with my left hand and the gohei hand on the back of her legs.

AHHH! INCOMING STAR BULLET!

The panic made me lose my grip entirely and I fall back into the ground like a rock down to the pit of your stomach like you did something wrong and you got caught.

DAAAHHHH! WHYYYY!

Wait. I can just make a yin-yang orb and once it's finished, jump off of that to land safely rather than just cushion my fall! Why didn't I think of this earlier?

I let my left arm limp toward the ground and form a giant yin-yang orb below me. It follows me and as it finishes, I waste no time trying to get myself in a position to leap off of the orb.

Ok this is awkward, but I don't want to break any bones.

As I approach the bottom, I shoot the yin-yang orb toward the ground and leap off of it at the same time and land back on it without any damage done to myself.

Phew. That was a close one.

It looks like Marisa's attack broke through and stopped Mokou's spell card. I like to say I did something there, but all I did was give Mokou a good punch. She's still up in there looking okay and still up to fight. Fiesty.

**"{Everlasting "Phoenix Tail"}"** Mokou calls out, as red-whiteish spheres started forming around her wings.

Another phoenix attack. Better be careful.

And careful being right I was. What seems like an infinite amount of flashy red spheres, start raining upon the entire area around us.

Aggh! No gaps! Take cover!

I run behind one of the bamboos to take cover from Mokou's attack which turns out pointless as it simply burns away at the bamboo.

Extreme heat. I can't even take decent cover from the Phoenix Tail.

Yukari's gone again. Alice is able to shield herself with her dolls that are wielding shields and Marisa is still SOMEHOW able to spiral rapidly like a roller coaster into the fire range without getting hit.

Insane witch! Are you trying to get yourself burned to death?

_"That's Marisa. She's probably just going to use her Master Spark. Too easy to predict, honestly."_ The Intuition comments after a while of me running from bamboo stalk to bamboo stalk to avoid getting burnt badly.

No. That can't be. Marisa can't be THAT straightforward can she?

_"You'll see."_ She says, disappearing so that I wouldn't be able to leave a comment.

Come on Marisa! Prove her wrong so I can finally get a point against that Intuition for once!

Marisa flies up higher into the air past Mokou and turns around to bring out the wooden object from her apron to point it at Mokou.

**"{Love Sign "Master Spark"}"** I hear Marisa shout before shooting the massive rainbow laser beam toward Mokou. Her witch hat flies away just from the full force of it and the Master Spark quickly approaches Mokou without hesitation or intention of being stopped.

Wait a second...

It's coming toward me! FRIENDLY FIRE! WATCH WHERE YOU'RE AIMING THAT THING MARISA! THIS IS THE SECOND TIME NOW!

I start sprinting away from the spot I was hiding to take cover from the Phoenix Tail and the "**Hmm**" buzz starts becoming louder, telling me to run even faster unless I wanted to get burnt like last time.

I'd rather not thank you. I really wouldn't like to relive that experience.

I don't even look back as I dive to the ground and cover my head to hear the Master Spark crash against the ground, blowing rocks and pebbles in my direction.

Finally, the "**Hmm**" noise stops and I stand back up to see Mokou still intact with no burn marks whatsoever anywhere on her.

What the heck? You should have been toast you cheater!

Hmm? If I look really close, there's a small part of her pants burnt. I think it's the spot where I accidentally grabbed that paper thing and fell down.

"Hey you survived ze! I'm impressed! Here's another one!" Marisa compliments and warns Mokou that she was going to launch a second Master Spark at her.

The wooden thing starts glowing and the Master Spark again, unleashes itself against Mokou.

Instead of trying to dodge as I would have, Mokou just flies straight toward it!

... Are you insane woman?

Nope she wasn't.

Instantly, a red ring forms around Mokou and the front area of her starts exploding and with it, flowing giant red circle bullets.

**"{Hourai "Fujiyama Volcano"}"** Mokou activates and the explosion stops.

The Master Spark finally shoots out towards Mokou, only to be blocked by that red ring around her.

It's just like Yukari's barrier, except smaller! I didn't know a volcano could be that powerful!

Soon, the Master Spark stops and Marisa looks extremely surprised to see Mokou untouched from the Master Spark.

Mokou fires off 3 lines of long red lasers attached to each other rapidly towards Marisa. She gets no time to dodge and she ends up getting knocked off her broom and starts falling towards the ground.

Marisa stretches her arm out toward her broom and it flies under her to catch her.

That better happen to me if I ever use Marisa's body and stretch my arm out to the broom like that. Jealousy jealousy...

Looks like it's Alice's turn to try and stop Mokou's rampage since she's flying up to try and attack Mokou.

Alice skillfully manages to stay away from the tri-bullets or block them, but an explosion from behind stops Alice and sends her falling down.

All right my turn!

I jump up as high as I can to try and get Mokou before she notices me and attacks me.

As I get halfway up to her, she turns around and sees me. Not good.

And as I fear, she shoots those tri-bullets at me.

I'll just double jump over them.

And so I do. I angle myself higher into the air to boost myself so that I would end up being higher than Mokou.

Ok, I got away from the tri-bullets. I think she'll probably try to bomb me with an explosion from behind. Well I can use that to boost me toward Mokou and stop her.

**POW!**

GAAAHHH!

The blast ends up in front of me instead and to follow that up, Mokou shoots out the red tri-bullets in the front.

I fall back down to the ground with what I feel like third degree burns on my body.

Dammit. I miscalculated that. And because of that, I ended up taking some severe punishment.

Urgh... I only burn all over. Stupid volcano. Coming close to it was a stupid idea. Why did I even think I could come close to Mokou without getting hurt?

Alice just flies past while Marisa goes back into the air as well.

Yukari walks up to my downed body and kneels down next to me for some reason I don't know.

"You really should have thought of something better Akyris. Trying to jump up there with no help is rather ridiculous isn't it?" Yukari asks me with that damn smile on her face.

_"She got you there you know. Why the hell would you try to jump up there with nothing to help you? The explosions are going to get you and if that's not the case, then the tri-bullets will shoot you back down."_ The Intuition agrees with Yukari, also analyzing my stupidity.

Yeah I learned that now, thanks.

Wait. Where's my gohei?

"_Your gohei? Mokou burnt it to a crisp after you got shot back down to the ground."_ The Intuition answered my question for me, only leaving me in a fit of rage.

My gohei! Nooooo!

I will avenge you! You were my faithful partner and weapon until the end. I'll get her for you, don't worry!

_"What about me?"_ The Intuition asks, giving me the impression that if she had a solid form, she would have been pointing at herself.

I just ignore her and quickly get back up with rage fueling my veins.

"Oh? Is there something wrong Akyris?" Yukari asks me, tilting her head on one side.

Yes, there is a clear angry expression on my face. See me grinding my teeth together?

**"{Magipulation "Return Inanimateness"}"** I hear a voice from above from the direction I was shot.

**KABOOOM!**

An explosion lights up the sky and the power shakes it as well. Alice lands back down on the ground in front of me, looking pretty tired from her recent spell card.

So the new spell card you just busted out is basically a stronger version of Artful Sacrifice?

If it's strong enough to stop Mokou, I'm fine with it.

Mokou just flies out of the explosion with a few marks on her and continues her assault on us.

Yukari, who was right next to me, just disappears again somehow and Alice has a frown face on her. I can definitey feel for you Alice since a lot of my attacks are failed attempts.

A laser from behind shoots Mokou in the back, making her temporarily stop her attack to face the assailant behind her.

It's Marisa! It looks like she's OK after all.

"Ooo~! Scary ze! You gotta catch me first if you want to get back at me!" Marisa taunts Mokou, flying higher into the air.

Marisa flies straight into the bamboo thicket and Mokou flies her into it to try and kill her.

"SHORYBROOMKEN!" I hear Marisa's voice from inside the thicket and out comes Mokou crashing out of it.

Chance hit!

I run toward Mokou's falling body, planning to use my last spell card with the perfect opportunity that was here. Once I reach Mokou's falling body...

**"{Divine Arts "Wind God Kick"}" **I call out my final spell card, following up Marisa's Shorybroomken with it.

Flip kick one, two, three. On 4th kick, I burst energy into the kick to launch Mokou into the air.

I quickly jump up after Mokou's rising body and perform one last hard kick to Mokou's chin to rise her higher into the air.

Wow! I did Wind God Kick right! Finally!

I even land gracefully with complete satisfaction on the successful spell card.

Marisa flies up to Mokou's rising body to chain with a baseball swing of her broom, sending her flying toward an open air. Until Yukari flies in and opens a gap in the air, bringing a train down to crush Mokou.

A train? Have you been to the real world or something Yukari?

Mokou doesn't lie under the train for long and it bursts open with an extremely angry Mokou. She turns at me with an evil glare at me like she's planning to get payback at me for using my spell card on her to get followed up attacks.

Mokou flies straight at me, barely hovering above the ground and fires a phoenix at me.

**"{Possessed by Phoenix"}"** I hear Mokou call out as I try to shake off the burning bird that was trying to hit me by running as fast as I can.

This thing keeps following me! Crap! I can't shake it off me!

_"Akyris! No matter what, don't let that thing touch you!"_ The Intuition warns me, though my intentions were the same as it's warnings anyway.

I'm trying here! That thing is too fast and I'm only human!

The phoenix eventually gains up on me and crashes onto my back, though no pain senses were alerted and it simply just pushes me to the ground flat on my face.

I can hear footsteps coming from behind me.

"You should get back up Akyris. Sleeping on the grass isn't good for you you know." Yukari's teasing voice filled my ears.

Yeah yeah, stop making fun of me for getting hit. It's not like I got wounded from that one anyway. I don't know what the Intuition was so scared about.

Huh? My arms... They aren't moving! What's going on!

Yukari seems to notice this and opens up a gap to fire giant circles at me. Without my control, I leap forward off of the ground and roll into a standing position.

Urgh... Come on! Arms! Legs! Do something!

_"It's useless Akyris. That phoenix that hit you wasn't an attack phoenix like the ones from before. It's a possession one and now you can't control yourself."_ The Intuition tells me the end results of being hit by it.

I never even heard of such a phoenix! Damn though... The name should have given it away. I just played stupid right there.

So what am I supposed to do now?

_"You're going to be stuck like this until you either die or Mokou chooses to release the phoenix in you."_ She tells me, not really giving me a clear answer.

So I'm dead.

_"Basically."_ She replies with a simple word.

Damn it all to hell...

Wait. If Mokou finds me completely useless against Yukari and the others, I'm just going to be tossed aside! That seems likely since I already used up all of my known spell cards and she really only has 3 attacks to choose from. She knows 1 which is my yin-yang orb, 2 technically from the giant 1, and she's never seen Searing Orb since I never used it. Plus to add to that, I can't even fly! Lastly, I don't use normal typical bullets like any of the other girls.

That seems illogical though. Why would she possess me instead of the other girls? I'm sure I didn't provide much help in this fight against her and the others are much more skillful. Maybe it was because I was vulnerable?

_"That could be true. You may want to have another look t_oo_. You just grew fire wings."_ And she cancels out my flying assumption. Great. But she still can't do crap with me. What's she going to do, ram the others?

The inside phoenix gets back up for me and it launches me toward Yukari, leaving trails of purple small, circle bullets behind me with my hands.

She flies up into the air to avoid the phoenix's bullets and maneuvers herself away from me.

Wait a second again. Where's Mokou? I can't find her anywhere!

My question never gets answered as I feel myself jerk to the left to follow Yukari.

This isn't getting me anywhere. I need to find a way to communicate with them to just knock me out or something.

_"You should still have control over your own voice. The phoenix is only just using your body so it should be okay."_ Ms. Intuition confirms for me, giving me a sense of relief.

All right then. I just need for them to knock me out in one hit so I can't do anything else. Sucks that I won't be conscious to see the end of this, but I don't think there's really no other choice here unless they want to kill me.

"Guys! There's a phoenix inside of me that's using my body to attack you guys! Knock me out in one hit so I can't do anything else!" I shout out to the group of ladies, though Marisa looks somewhat confused.

Alice tells Marisa of what she knows and it seems like she gets it now. You caught on fast, but I really have to give credit to Yukari. She noticed it in a snap and I was sure that the phoenix was barely giving any signs.

While I fly higher into the air towards Alice, Marisa stops me and smashes me back down with her broom and I land flat on the grass.

I hear someone land near my body, but whoever it is, isn't trying to hit me.

The phoenix inside gets back up for me and turns around to see that it's Marisa who just landed.

I rush toward Marisa at high speed and attempt to punch Marisa, missing but following up with a flip kick to send Marisa into the air.

Alice flies down and attempts to immobilize me by trying to stab and slash my legs. That might be a better idea.

I have to find a way to make this easier for them to stop me. Maybe if I can fight over for control against the phoenix.

_"You won't get back control, but maybe you can just hold yourself long enough so that someone can stop you."_ The Intuition said, giving me a wave of determination.

Good. That should work then.

I try to regain control of myself, but the phoenix's grip on me is too strong and I only feel stiff from trying to push through.

Marisa continues to try and whack me with her broom while Alice is trying to slice and stab my legs with her dolls. Yukari is trying to hold me in place by placing gaps on the ground where she thinks I will land.

Yes! Gap behind me! That's perfect!

I push every bit of will I have toward my leg and it temporarily breaks through the phoenix's control, making it move toward the open floor.

As I land in it, it closes up, leaving my leg stuck in the ground, preventing myself from escaping.

Perfect! Go ahead guys!

Marisa smashes my arm with her broom with a mimic baseball swing of what I did while Alice hacks and slashes at my leg like no tomorrow while Yukari just stays in the air.

AGGH! OWW! THE PAIN!

I hear a screech within myself and the burning sensation on my back which I assume was from the fire wings, disappeared.

That was a close one. I don't know what could have happened if that phoenix possessed me any longer. We got lucky that Mokou didn't shoot any yin-yang orbs.

Damn though... Maybe I should have let it stay a little longer in me so that I could learn how to shoot bullets from it.

The phoenix that took over my body flies into the air and just disappears, leaving Mokou behind.

Wait... so you're the one who possessed me?

The gap that's holding my leg opens up and I take it out of it, only to fall to the ground from the pain that I took.

I'm out for the battle now. My right leg has never hurt so much and there's no way I can move on it. Alice sure did a damn good job on making me completely useless.

I slowly limp over to a nearby tree sit against and look up to see Mokou do something new.

**"{Hourai Doll"}" **Mokou uses a surprising new spell card. A doll spell card

Hourai Doll? Alice looks pretty insulted by it.

Red small circle bullets lined about on the far sight side of Mokou about 25 feet away from her and the same appeared for the left side except blue.

Each of them targeted the various ladies, though it seems both of them dodge with ease as they simply move along with the flow of the bullets.

However, as most of the bullets miss, they leave behind one of the bullets and the longer Yukari and the others dodge, the more bullets that are kept in place, limiting the room the ladies had to evade.

Soon, Mokou starts shooting small diamond yelllow bullets around her and to follow that up, red lasers join in the fray, leaving even less room to maneuver around.

Finally, it looks like Marisa has had enough and brings out the wooden object again.

**"{Magicannon "Final Spark"}"** Marisa calls out before launching another giant laser towards Mokou. One that was even bigger than the Master Spark.

All the bullets that Mokou had shot, dissipate into the Final Spark and Mokou is engulfed.

No! If she dies, she might revive with full stamina back! If that happens, we might not win!

Marisa's Final Spark still persists and it lasts for about another 5 seconds before disappearing.

Mokou is still in the air! Phew, I think she's still alive.

She looks really tired though and there are black marks on her and her clothes are semi burnt off.

**"{Imperishable Shooting}" **Mokou tiredly activates, forming a huge circle of small bullets around her.

Well, she has the name right. I don't see any bullets that are being shot from her.

The bullets move out to form what it looks like a flower before going back into circle formation, then spreading out among our group.

Oh crap! It's coming! I can barely move though!

As I struggled to get behind the tree, continuous jolts of pain entered my leg and I couldn't ignore it.

The bullets hit me, sending more pain along my body and I end up laying on the ground just from it.

Ow... That's it. I'm too tired to do anything anymore.

I can't even bring myself to get back up to stand.

**"{Bounded Field "Boundary of Life and Death"}" **I just barely hear as my ear laid against the cold grass.

That must be Yukari's attack. Boundary of Life and Death sounds like an attack that's perfect for her.

Either Mokou barely lives through her attack, or she dies and revives. It's basically an all or nothing right now.

I wonder if Yukari knows that though.

I push myself so that my stomach faces up and so that I can see Yukari's attack against Mokou.

All the bullets... they're all so beautiful... it's almost hypnotizing to see.

It's like taking a glimpse of death. It's beautiful, but it's price, the life of someone, or yours.

It really is a boundary. There's so many bullets and getting hit just one by them could lead to chain of events leading to death. But if your strong enough or skillful enough, you could live through it by the skin of your teeth.

My breathing is harsh and heavy, and my lungs feel desperate for the forest air.

Against that many bullets, Mokou's Imperishable Shooting stands no chance against the border of life and death. I think this battle is ours if Mokou doesn't die.

And so, Mokou eventually gets overwhelmed and falls to the ground from Yukari's spell card because she doesn't shoot any new bullets while Yukari spams so much, I can't even see her.

"Ow ow..., too strong." Mokou comments, tired from her battle with all of us.

"Wow, you really are invincible! That's pretty cool ze!" Marisa says as she flies down next to Mokou's fallen figure.

"Even after my Boundary of Life and Death, you still live. You truly are an immortal. You're very amusing." Yukari gaps next to me, though talking to Mokou.

Is that all you find exciting?

"I'm quite surprised though. I could have sworn that she was close to death many times." Alice joins in on the conversation between us all.

"Yeah uhh, could someone help me up since Alice disabled my leg?" I ask someone to get me off the ground.

"I'll help you Reimu." Alice says, as she pulls my arm over her shoulder and slowly lifts me off the ground.

"Ahhh, thanks Alice." I thank her gratefully as I finally get off of the ground by using Alice as support.

"You're getting pretty sloppy Reimu. You're going to get beat by a random youkai someday Reimu." Marisa tells me, though that could probably happen if I fought a random youkai.

"So is this trial finally over?" I decide to say, getting the urge to just go back to the shrine and sleep.

"You people are too strong. I don't see the point of taking a trial of guts from Kaguya if you're this strong." Mokou decides to say something about us taking a trial of guts.

"We were simply bored with really nothing better to do. Doesn't a trial of guts sound interesting to you?" Yukari asks Mokou, giving a smile towards her.

"I guess it does. So is your's done? It's almost dawn." Mokou says, pointing toward the east side.

"What~? Already?" Marisa seems sad about the trial ending. Or is it the rising sun.

"I should be going back home then. I am getting rather sleepy." Yukari says, snapping her fingers to open a gap next to her. "Have a wonderful time everyone."

And she disappears into the gap, leaving no trace of her at all. Great way of transporation.

So are we just gonna leave Mokou here then? Ok, I'm in then.

"Can you guys take me back to the shrine? I don't think I can get there on my own." I ask Alice or Marisa to help me up back to the shrine.

"Very well Reimu. I did leave you crippled, so this is the least I can do." Alice answers to my question, making me a happy miko.

"Thanks. Good luck over there!" I bid farewell to the girl on the grass since I still didn't really know her name. Mokou was just given to her by me so it would make things easier. It's starting to get attached to me though.

"Farewell." She says, struggling to get off of the forest floor to walk off toward the forest.

And so, we begin our long trek back to the shrine. The sun was starting to rise and by the time we got back to the shrine, dawn rose.

Marisa follows Alice and me out of the forest and strikes up some old convos like suggesting I eat a mushroom so my leg would heal faster. I just politely refuse, not knowing what the mushroom could do. Old memories just make me shudder of what happened last time.

**Gensokyo: Hakurei Shrine**

Alice puts me down on the shrine's steps, letting me rest on it and decides to go inside and make all of us some tea.

The slash marks and holes in my left leg are still on my leg.

Is it me, or is it slowly closing up? I guess I didn't see Yukari use the boundary healing on me. Should thank her later if I still get stuck here.

My eyes are starting to droop from my exhaustion and Marisa is starting to notice it.

"You're really that tired Reimu? You should sleep in today like Yukari!" Marisa suggests, on which I would agree.

"Sure, I think I'll do that later." I agree whole-heartedly, leaning my head slowly back against the stone steps.

And Alice comes back out with a tray of tea. Coincidental?

"Thanks Alice." I say as I grab a cup of tea from the tray while Marisa takes one from it as well.

She nods and sits down between me and Marisa while having a doll grab her cup for her to take from her. I just listen to Marisa and Alice talk about various things such as Alice scolding Marisa about something she borrowed from someone named Patchouli.

I can't really talk about any of what they're talking about since I don't know who is who and what is what here.

Hey, Intuition.

_"Hmm?"_ She replies, with the questioning tone.

"I may not see, err, hear you again after this. So I would like to say thank you for all your help. I would never have survived Gensokyo if it wasn't for you." I graciously thank her, trying to perform a bow to her in my head.

_"Oh. Your welcome! It was nice knowing you in this short time. I won't forget you. Good luck getting back to your world!"_ She says before disappearing, maybe for the last time.

Well if I get stuck here, I may hear you more.

"Reimu! What's wrong with your body!" Marisa asks me, standing up while looking panicked.

Hmm? I'm feeling sleepy all of a sudden. What's going on?

Golden balls of light are slowly leaving my body and floating up into the air.

What's going on? My mind is slowly blanking out on me.

It's taking everything I have to not faint right here. Eventually, the urge to sleep takes over me and I faint onto the floor.

"Reimu! What's wrong! Are you OK?" Is the last thing I hear before blanking out.

...

**Gap: Border Between Gensokyo and Real World**

Urghh... My head hurts...

Where am I?

I slowly try to blink my eyes open to attune to the light.

And the first thing I see is a damn cute girl with brown hair right in front of me. Naughty thoughts.

"Oh. Uhhh. Hi!" I say to the person in front of my face, finally noticing that it was Renko.

***SLAP**

**

* * *

****A.N: And so ends Imperishable Night. Akyris gets a slap, but what for? What do you guys think? I honestly did my best on this so if you get the chance, rate/review please! Thanks!**


	8. Home Sweet home: Part 1

**A.N: Yay! After such a long time, this is finally posted! This chapter is shorter than usual and well, yeah. I don't really have anything to say about being so late, but I hope you enjoy this nonetheless! **

* * *

**Gap: Border Between Gensokyo and Real World**

...

That hurt you know!

"Why did you slap me!" I half-angrily ask Renko, touching my puffed up cheek with my hand.

I'm laying against the floor on my back on a makeshift bed pretty tired and the first thing you do is slap me.

"Well, that's what you get for taking a look at Reimu's breasts like that. Don't you have any respect?" She explains to me in a huff of anger as well and turns around to leave the room.

Awww come on... this is karma biting me in the butt isn it? How the hell did she catch me?

Urgh... I better apologize and promise not to do it again. I guess these are my last days of breast looking. If my perverted thoughts get the best of me again, something worse might happen. She might even hate me at this point.

Maribel comes in and kneels down next to me, looking the same as ever. I can see a slight blush on her face. Did she see me have a look at it too?

"I'm relieved to see that you've made it through your first incident Akyris-san. It must have been very harsh doing battle with all the residents there." Maribel says, showing me some concern.

Thanks. I really appreciate that you're caring. I really mean it. It's good to be back in my world again.

To add to that, I mentally and physically smile to Maribel.

"It was...tiring to say the least. I don't even know how Reimu deals with all the things that revolve around her." I add to Maribel's statement, sighing at all the craziness that ensued while I was Reimu.

"I would expect that. Though with your success during that incident, the gap between our world and Gensokyo is already starting to close up." Maribel explains to me, giving me a sense of relief that I did solve the incident after all.

So with every incident that I solve, the gap starts repairing to close itself up. Makes sense.

"Would you like some tea Akyris-san?" She asks, standing up in case I said yes.

"Sure. That would be nice." I answer, and she leaves to go make some tea.

I sigh to myself and fold my hands onto my stomach. My leg pain that I got from Gensokyo is corresponding with my leg here. I can't even move it without sending painful surges to myself. So if I die in the game, will I actually die here?

It makes me shudder of what will happen when I get back home and have Mom take a look at it. Or maybe I can hide it. Actually, how the hell am I going to be able to walk back home with this cursed leg?

Oh yeah. Since I'm back in between the border of Gensokyo and the real world, this must kind of be like a home place where if I'm finished with an incident, it's where I go back to.

And Maribel walks back into my resting room with a tray of tea and Renko. Renko looks like she's calmed down. They kneel down next to me to put down the tea tray and Maribel tries to get me to sit up slowly so I don't injure myself.

Both Renko and Maribel grab a cup from the tray while Maribel takes two to hand over to me slowly.

"Thanks Maribel." I thank her for the tea, before slowly putting it against my mouth to sip.

The hot tea slowly floods and enters my throat and I stop drinking for a sec to regain my breath.

Awkward silence. I might as well try and apologize here to get the perversion related topics out of the way.

"I'm uhh, sorry for peeking at Reimu's breasts like that. I know it was wrong and I won't do it again." I apologize to Renko, even lowering my head to try and show some respect. Yeah, I have some shame you know.

As I take a peek at her eyes, she looks pretty surprised at me apologizing, then reverts back to normal to ruffle my hair with her hand.

"It's all right. You're a teenager. Maybe I should have been slightly more lenient. But you better not do that again." She accepts my apology, then pokes my shoulder with her finger before going back to drink her tea.

"Fine. I promise." I reluctantly say, knowing what kind of sacrifices I would have to make to keep that promise.

So that means no more peeping on girls or whatever. I'm a guy with hormones who's 17, just kill me.

And to silently seal that, we all take a sip of our warm tea while I sigh from the exhaustion.

"So why don't you tell us what happened over in Gensokyo." Renko tells me, curious of my troubles and disasters in Gensokyo.

Shouldn't you know what happened if you caught me peeping at Reimu's breasts? Or maybe you just want more details from me? Well, You'll get it then.

"Well, how do I start?" I start off, going on to explain on what happened before, during, and after the incident. No "Once Upon A Time," here unfortunately.

And I slowly recall my last endeavors over the past days in Gensokyo, telling them of who I met and my battles with the people during and after the incident.

I leave out parts that involve the Intuition as to keep her as a secret for now. Someday, I'll tell them that Reimu's Intuition is a seperate entity from her.

They laugh and nod and frown at various parts of my story-telling of what happened. Laughing especially when Renko heard that Marisa had a party at the shrine without my consent and when all the residents ended up taking all of my dango. Maribel giggled at that part.

When I finally finish, silence just fills the air for a while. Our tea was long done and the cups back on the tray. I lean back onto the bed tiredly to breathe a sigh of exhaustion.

"I have to say, I was very lucky to get through that incident without dying. Yukari said that I progressed rapidly through some of Reimu's attacks even though it was only 3 attacks, technically 2 since I use the giant yin-yang orb now plus 2 spell cards." I told them, bringing surprise to their faces.

Maybe compliments from Yukari don't come very often?

"Unfortunately, 3 days have passed since you entered Gensokyo to solve Imperishable Night. You haven't shown up at your house or at your school for 3 days straight. Your parents are starting to panic and are on the verge of calling the police." Renko explained the situation to me, making my mind stop cold for a moment.

...

Oh ****! I was so absorbed about Gensokyo that I never wondered about the time frame of my time in Gensokyo and my world! How am I going to explain this all to my parents and at my school?

Hey wait a moment again. How do you know that my parents were starting to panic?

"You're going to have to think of an excuse to make sure no one finds out that you were actually in Gensokyo. The less people know about this, the better." Renko continues to explain to me, as I continued to comprehend the information she gave to me.

"But I'll never be able to get back home with my leg in this condition. I can't even move it without hurting myself like a bastard. How am I going to get back home?" I ask Renko, curious as to how I would be able to get back home.

"We're going to exit the gap and help you home. When your parents question you, just say we're your friends or something. I hope you have a good excuse in mind since I'm not a good improviser." Renko answers, finally concluding on what she had to say.

"Wait wait wait. I thought you guys couldn't exit this world." I question on how they weren't attached to this area.

"What? Did you really think we would just stay here all the time? We're not attached to this gap you know." Renko answers me, sighing while Maribel just shakes her head.

Oh. So that's how you know that my parents are starting to go nuts over me disappearing for 3 days. I guess I should have known better.

"Oh. Ok. So when are we going back?" I turn my tired head the other way to face the wall.

"We were planning to leave now, actually Akyris-san." Maribel answers that for me, and I turn my head back toward them.

Oh. I was expecting to get a bit more rest before departing, but I guess this is OK too. In fact, being more tired might help more with my excuse.

Maribel goes to the other side next to me and crouches down with Renko on the other side and I take that as a sign to put my arms around them.

They lift me up off the bed and I slowly walk with support from Renko and Maribel over to the entrance of the house and over to the gap at the entrance of the forest.

It takes a while since I sometimes fumble over and hit my leg against a wall with the occasional "OW!", but we eventually reach there and we carefully enter the gap that lead back to our world.

I close my eyes as darkness covers me and my stomach starts churning around with my mind in a complete blank. I keep my eyes closed for a while until finally, sunlight flashed onto my eyes and I slowly reopened them as to slowly adjust to it.

"We're here Akyris-san." The soft voice from Maribel fills my right ear and the fuzziness from my eyesight clears up to allow me to see the clearing that we were in and the forest path.

"So you guys know where my house is?" I ask, curious if they knew where I lived.

"Yes, we do. It's not actually far from here." Renko says, slowly helping me move through the forest as we begin our trek to my house.

Yeah. It's not far. But it does seem that way when you're really tired though. Since when do you guys know where my house is anyway?

**Time Skip**

**Real World: Akyris' House  
**

Our trip to my house is pretty eventful. Not like I thought it would be.

Cars that pass by me give me interesting looks. Not literally, but its the people inside of them that do. Maybe it's because of these 2 girls helping me get back to my house.

Renko was trying to raise topics with me and Maribel does the same. Topics like "What senior year is like for me" and "If I can drive yet." No I can't drive yet sadly and senior year is just bumming me out at this point. Renko pokes fun at me for my incapability to drive. How about you then?

Just going back to school is a pain right now. Even Gensokyo would be better off right now, but I still got something to live for.

"I hope you have that excuse in mind Akyris." Renko reminds me before ringing the doorbell to my house.

Yeah, don't worry. I got the perfect plan. It'll be payback for you too!

"I pretend to fall asleep as the door opens and my Mom sees me with my head down, thinking I'm completely exhausted with 2 girls carrying me.

"Yes? Oh my god! Akyris! Please, bring him in!" My Mom panics and quickly urges Renko and Maribel to take me inside into the house.

Hehehe. This is my excuse! Staying asleep so you have to do all the work for me! Good luck making your excuse now Renko! Hahahaha! This is what you get for slapping me!

I feel my body going up the stairs and I slowly peek for a moment to see me get carried into my room where Renko and Maribel set me down onto my bed.

A set of hands land on my head, probably to check my temperature, and it leaves after doing its duty.

"Where did you find him? How is he like this?" My Mom asks Renko and Maribel forcefully, impatient for an answer on how I ended up like this.

Ohohohoho, I got you now!

No answer comes for a while and I keep my neutral face as long as I can while impatiently waiting for Renko or Maribel to answer my Mom's question.

"We..." I hear from Renko as she hesitates to try and find an answer to Mom's question.

"We found him collapsed out near the forest. He was sprawled on the forest floor." Maribel answers for Renko, and I take a small peek to see Maribel's hands sweat with nervousness.

...

"What was he doing out there!" My Mom says loudly, before taking deep breaths to try and calm herself down to now blow up to them.

She takes a final breath before deciding to talk again.

"Thank you for bringing him back though. I was sure that someone kidnapped him or something along those borders." My Mom thanks the 2 girls and Renko replies with a quick "your welcome."

"We should leave Akyris alone. He may be just suffering from exhaustion. He needs his rest." My Mom concludes, before I take another peek to see her leading herself and Renko and Maribel outside of my room.

My door closes, and I open my eyes fully and break my neutral face.

Damn lucky bastards. You got lucky Renko! Maribel came in just in time to save you! I'll pay you back yet! Somehow.

***CREAAAAAAAKKKKK.**

What was that? The sound of my window? There's only 1 person who does that.

"Yo!" I snap my head toward my window to hear Lokon's voice and to see him squatting all the way down on my windowpane.

"ECK! SHHH!" I panic and quickly try to shush him to be quiet as to not break my guise of sleeping.

His cheerful faces turns to seriousness and he turns his gaze at my door, looking like hes focusing on it to listen for any sounds.

After a few moments, he relaxes and climbs slowly down to my floor to not make any noise and sit down on my computer chair.

"So where were you for 3 days? You weren't at school or at your house and I couldn't find you anywhere." Lokon whispers quietly to me, curious as to where I disappeared.

I'll just go with Maribel's excuse. If I tell him my own excuse and he finds out from my Mom or something, it might not end too well.

"I don't know. One day I was sleeping and somehow, I find myself on the floor of a forest. And I'm hecka tired too so that doesn't help." I lie to him using Maribel's lie, and I lay back onto the bed.

"I see. That does sound unrealistc, kind of like an anime. There's gotta be a reason of why you were out there." He ponders, going into what I call his thinking mode.

Lokon is one hell of a thinker. It'll be hell if he actually finds out I'm scrapped up with Touhou's incidents.

"So how did you know I was back in my house?" I ask, trying to get him to stray away of the lie of how I just laid in the forest.

"I saw you being carried by 2 girls. Their pretty damn cute! At the same time as you got conked, 2 cute girls help you back to your house! You are one lucky senior!" He quietly shouts his excitement, though I can see him conflicting not to say that out loud to me.

The problems they sucked me into is pretty troublesome though. I wonder why the heck I'm helping them out. Oh yeah! Because if I don't, the government could find the broken gap and it might cause a catastrophe. Real fun.

A random surge of pain flows through my hurt leg and I clinch my eyes together as hard as I can and hold in my urge to scream in pain! My arms instinctually rush to my leg to just hold it to try and ease the pain.

Lokon sees my pain moment and stands up quickly to see what's wrong with me.

"Akyris? What's wrong?" He asks me, clearly worried about my pain.

"It's all right. I'm fine." I lie through my teeth and grit it together to ease some of the afterstress once the pain goes away.

Alice's dolls are fricking brutal! These aftereffects are no joke! Did she poison her dolls' weapons or something?

I carefully pull my arms away from my leg and slowly straighten myself out on my bed.

...?

I hear footsteps. And from the looks of it, it looks like Lokon just caught that too.

He quicky gets off of the chair to rush to my windowpane to jump out of my window and quickly leaves a "Talk to you tomorrow Akyris."

Lokon. Sometmes, I wonder how the hell you react so fast to situations.

My door opens and in comes Renko and Maribel who walk up next to my bed and I quickly shut my eyes as to avoid being caught..

"We know you're awake Akyris-san. Please get up." Maribel's soft voice fills my ears and I open it as I find out that they already know I'm awake.

Aww damn it. I guess they just went along with me pretending to be asleep when they helped me up to my room.

"Yes?" I ask what Maribel wanted me up for.

They were both sitting next to my soft bed in that japanese fashion.

Damn it all though. I was hoping to get Renko back for slappng me with her failure of improvising. Thinking about it now though, maybe it's not such a good idea since that could spoil our secret.

"It would be best if we were known as your friends rather than classmates or anybody else. Please be sure to refer us as that if anyone happens to ask about us." Maribel tells me with Renko nodding and my mind agreeing.

"Our best course of action would be to let you rest for about a week before having you enter the next incident. If all goes well, we may be able to close the gap within 3 months." Renko finally decides to put her word in on how to manage on how to solve all the incidents.

"3 months? Someone is going to find the gap in that amount of time though!" I exclaim as quietly as I can, hoping that they woul have a backup to that.

"Don't worry. Not just anyone can come in. They have to actually be exposed to Maribel's initial gap entering before being able to enter or leave. Also, no one can see it." Renko adds in, calming my slight moment of panic.

"We don't know how long it may stay that way, so it's best to solve this as soon as possible." Renko concludes her explanation, giving me the sense of duty to solve all the incidents.

Yeah. But with this 1 week time, I can go on my computer to find out what attacks the bosses may have and if I get any partners like Imperishable Night.

Almost slipped my mind too! I should look up that missing option on Imperishable Night. There was that Trial of Guts after beating Kaguya so I should see if that's related to the game.

"Stop by the gap sometime when you feel better Akyris. Your leg might hurt for a while, but it should heal up." Renko says before standing back up to leave the room with Maribel.

"Thank you for helping us Akyris-san. We're very grateful!" Maribel smiles at me with that cute smile before getting nudged by Renko to leave my room with her.

Jealousy? Nah, just kidding.

And they both leave, closing the door slowly to give me some peace.

Well, I can't get up on my own and Mom still thinks I'm asleep so I might as well play that role. I actually think I'm going to go to sleep. I just wonder how long I'm going to sleep.

I look at my clock to see that it's around 4 in the afternoon. I guess I'm going to miss dinner.

And I close my eyes to let my mind shut down on its own and the pits of sleep eventually fills my mind, shooing away all my thoughts and pain to allow me to rest.

**Day 1: Akyris' House**

...

Hmm?

My mind slowly turns itself back on, but no light shines on my closed eyes.

My eyes decide to open by themselves, though too quickly for my tastes, and I see that it's around nighttime.

One look to the left tells me that it's 2:33 in the morning. It is way too early for me to be awake. But at the same time, I slept extremely early so an exception could probably be made here.

I get up from my cozy bed reluctantly and inch my way out of it, exposing myself to the cold air.

I'm getting that feeling most people feel when they get out of bed. They wanna go back in and just stay there.

As I move my injured leg onto floor, it decides to feel wobbly, and crumples to the ground, forcing me to grip onto the bed's edge to gain support.

DAGH! Bad idea to try and move it after all! And it's not helping that it's just screaming in pain! Cursed leg damn it.

I have nothing better to do so maybe I can look up that option for Imperishable Night.

I'll just have to hold onto things on the way to my computer chair, then I'll be OK to just sit on my chair.

I first grip onto my bed, dragging my way over to the windowpane to lean my hand onto it as to not fall to the floor, eventually nearing my solid computer table.

I use the table to lift my legs off of the floor and plop my butt onto the butt of the chair and crack a few fingers before hitting the computer's on button.

Oh computer, how I have missed you! It feels great to have my hands back on the keyboard. Now let's see what the mystery option is.

I boot up Imperishable Night on my desktop and wait a moment for the fullscreen loading screen to replace my wallpaper. A quick check tells me that is's only thursday.

Finally, the main menu shows up and the unpickable option is an Extra Stage. An Extra Stage huh? Coincidence? Let's find out!

Damn, I can't pick it. My highlighting just passes over it. Maybe I have to beat the game first? I just ran myself through it though. Doesn't that count?

My fingers set themselves on the arrow keys and on the bottom left side of the keyboard to prepare against the oncoming stages that would eventually read up to Eientei.

My mind just wanders off as my hand just clicks on the controls according to what appears on my eyes. I sigh to myself and I barely even focus on the game in front of me. My second death in the second stage already?

Well, I'm not going to focus anytime soon. There's just too much things on my mind that's taking priority right now like when to visit Renko and Maribel and my excuse for not going to school.

I end up just giving up in the middle of Mystia's Night Sparrow and exit the game entirely to just browse the internet.

Hmm. I wonder if I should break that promise and just take a sneak peak at girls here. Or she could be watching me again like how she somehow caught me looking at Reimu's! No I probably won't. If she caught me doing it in Gensokyo, she could catch me doing it here.

Yeesh. No telling what she would do to me after I promised not to look at another girl's upper body area.

I guess I can just do some research on the Touhou series of incidents then. Knowing what I'll be up against could help my chances of living.

I could pass on Imperishable Night today and just look at that another time since it looks like I'm past that.

Let's have a look at Perfect Cherry Blossom then. I remember seeing Lokon playing one of the stages on there when I went over to his house.

And time passes slowly as I look up on the internet the background for Perfert Cherry Blossom, eventually going on to the possible people I could play as.

Only 3 people could be played this time and the chances I would get Reimu again seemed low. A newbie against Yukari was just out of the question.

I continued to look at the various stages and characters that involved themselves in it. From the information I looked at, winter was everlasting through the spring months in Gensokyo and it did not look like it was going to end anytime soon.

The character that the player picked would go out and investigate the extended winter months, similar to Imperishable Night, though Marisa went out to semi-investiate, only to end up fighting me and Yukari. Because only 3 characters can be chosen, the character picked would be solo throughout the game.

Well great. Perfect Cherry Blossom is probably a game I would want to avoid then.

Let's see if there's anything else to note...

**THUMP**

Oh crap! Footstep! I gotta get back to bed or whoevers coming up isn't going to like that I'm up at 4 in the morning! I'm not taking any risks!

**THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP**

The sound of heavy footsteps comes closer and closer as it goes up the stairs and I panic even more.

I hurry to use the table to get myself off of the chair and rush toward the bed, attempting to ignore whatever pain I was feeling in my legs. In the end, I trip over my feet from trying to move too quickly and fall over onto the floor!

Agh! So close! What am I going to do!

The door to my room opens slowly and I just lay against the floor on my side without moving.

"Hmm?" I hear a voice of a guy at my doorway and my heart beats really fast as I try not to think of what could happen. I forgot that he sometimes has late night parties with his friends.

I take a small peek, using my chair and the darkness to see my Dad at the door, looking at my turned on computer.

I shut my eyes as he turns his face to look at my bed, then at me, and I hear him sigh to himself.

"Get up Akyris. I know your up." I hear his gruff and tired voice say to me.

Are you serious! I forgot to turn off the monitor! That could have at least helped me a bit! Now I'm dead!

I mentally sigh to myself and lay myself flat on my back to use my arms to sit up, but not get up completely.

"What are you doing up this early in the morning Akyris?" My Dad asks me, expecting me to give him a satisfying answer.

"Uhh, I slept really early and when I woke up, I didn't want to stay in bed for a couple of more hours so I wanted to use the computer." I told him, biting my lip in hopes that it would bring me some luck.

That's most of it. I just left out the "I'm researching so I know whats going to come up and lose some risk of dying when I'm solvng another Touhou incident."

It hurts to lie, but parents are pretty authority-authentical so I'm not going to risk anything here.

He sighs and walks over to me, notcing the bandagedinjuries on my leg.

"How did you get these? You shouldn't be out of bed with wounds like this." He asks me, instantly making me nervous on how I should respond.

Ok that's a tough one. I'll do the no answer response. That usually works.

Eventually, he just decides to help me off the floor and lets me sit on the bed to try and explain what crazy thing I did to get all this.

"If you don't want to say anything. I won't push, but I expect an answer on your unusual behavior tonight. Now go back to sleep." He finally says before heading out my door, closing it along the way, leaving me alone.

Yay it worked. This'll give me time to make something up when he expects a full answer.

But now what am I going to do? I can't exactly move and I assume that tomorrow, I'll at least be able to move around with some difficulties.

As I ponder, I hear a knock at my window before it opens up, letting cold air into my room.

"Yo! I was wondering when he was gonna leave." I hear Lokon's voice whisper loudly to me, proceeding to go ahead and hop into my room.

Lokon? Isn't this too early for you? Go back to your own house!

"What are you doing here?" I ask him in an annoyed tone so that he would get it that he wasn't welcome right now.

And you already look like your dressed up for school today. What important thing could you possibly have that could make you come to my house at 4 something in the morning? Haven't you heard of something called sleep?

"I woke up early and I got bored. So I just decided to hop on over to your house. Plus I want to hear more about those girls. You sound like you know them and nothing will stop me from knowing about girls. Especially the cuties that brought you back home!" He replies, putting that gruesome smile back on his face.

You pervert! This is probably where I got my perversion from!

"So who are they? I don't think " He asks me, giving me that sly wink.

You want names? Technically, I don't know them either so too bad!

"They're girls." I dumbly say to try and tick off Lokon with my smart-aleck mouth.

"Don't play stupid Akyris. At least one of them should have told their name to you." He replied with an annoyed tone. Just the kind of reaction I wanted."So who are they seriously?"

"I don't know. I never got their names." I semi-lied to him. I got their names before entering Gensokyo, but technically, I never would have got it since the excuse was that I was unconscious from exhaustion.

He gives me no answer and just rubs his hand over his forehead. Yeah, you like that answer don't you? You aren't coming close to any of those 2.

And I did not just play protective over them. Their older than me for damns sake!

"You looked really tired before you just suddenly disappeared. Can't you remember anything after going to sleep?" Lokon asks me, trying to obtain any more scrap of information from me.

"No. I don't even know how I ended up leaving the room somehow." I lie to him, biting my tongue slightly.

He ponders about it for a bit more, before just sighing, probably deciding to give up on the topic.

Well since you want adventure so much, why don't you witch with me. Actually, second thought, you would probably just use that to your adventage to just take breast shots with a camera or something.

I did not just play protective of Renko and Maribel.

"So what did I miss at school?" I ask Lokon, mostly just curious on who Mrs. Onomura did since she usually played the teacher bully on me.

"Hmm? School? You didn't really miss too much in history. Mrs. Onomura just decided to leave all of us alone since you weren't around to sleep in class. For math, you're missing a ton of notes and homework so you should probably copy mine later." He answered, making my opinion of Mrs. Onomura go even lower if that was even possible.

Man. Is it just me you hate? Why?

"Mr. Shizo has been piling up a lot of homework too, so it might take a while for you to copy." Lokon adds, setting down his backpack and taking out his binderto pull out 6 sheets of paper, all filled with numbers and words.

...

I'm very happy to see that your letting me borrow your notes right now. I don't have anything that I can give you right now, but I'll make it up somehow and someday.

He leaves his math notes and homework on top of my desk before deciding to help himself to my computer chair.

"Thanks. I really appreciate this. I'll copy all this sometime today. I owe you." I thank him,, struggling to give Lokon a genuine smile.

"Oh good. Then you can cancel that owe by telling me more about those 2 girls when you can!" He replies with that smug smile, making my failed genuine smile turn right back into a frown.

And the positive belief I just had for you drops back down to the negative zone.

"Can't you think of anything else besides those 2 girls?" I ask him, hoping he would change my owe to him.

He goes into silent mode for a while, closing his black eyes for a while before reopening them.

"No." He says blandly, making me drop my head crestfallen about his decision.

Damn you Lokon. That's one owe you might never be satisfied with then.

"What are the chances I'm going to see them again though? It could just be a one time thing. Save someone and then just leave. You might want to think of something else." I try to change the conditions, crossng my fingers under the blankets.

...

"Hmm. Well you have a point. All right. I'll think of something else then. But not right now. Maybe tomorrow." He relieves most of my worries by decding to change his conditions.

Phew. As long as he doesn't drag Maribel and Renko into the owe, I don't have to give any more information.

"Not! Sucker! Didn't I say that nothing will stop me from knowing about girls?" He psyches me, making me remain silent for a while to try and hold in my semi-surprise.

...

Oh come on! Why the hell are you so damn persistent on trying to find out about Renko and Maribel!

"You suck Lokon, I hope you know that." I say to him, quelling down my urge to make an outburst and wake my parents up.

"Thanks. I love comments like those." He pushes my insult aside and smiles that wily smile.

Great. Just great. I need to get him out of here before he asks anything else.

"Are you going to leave anytime soon? It's not like I have anything to do right now since I can't really move without hurting myself. I'm probably gonna stay home from school today." I urge him to just leave already so that I wouldn't have to give him any more details then I have to.

"Fine. But you better get me something about them or I'm gonna keep pestering you about it." He says before starting to head towards my window.

Ok. I'll just give an age. That should satisfy you. If that doesn't work, I'll just say its all I got. You poke your nose in way too deep.

"Tomorrow. I want to sleep. See you." I say before he jumps out of my window and onto the sidewalk, landing rather clumsily though.

And he forgot to close my window before he jumped off my roof.

Suddenly, a big yawn overcomes me and I cover my mouth with one of my hands.

Aww what? I'm tired again for some reason. Maybe it's because I moved too much when I should be recovering instead? I got a good amount of sleep though at the least.

Well. A little more wouldn't hurt. Wouldn't be surprised if I slept the whole day though. Dad might not get that answer until then. Too bad. And Lokon too.

Might be better that way though. I'll think of an excuse.

Sometime later though.

And my mind just slowly blanks out as the last thing I hear is the door to my room opening.

* * *

**A.N: The end! For now. Hopefully I'll be able to post the next chapter faster than this one. I feel really angry at myself. Please R/R! I could really use some help and advice!**


	9. Home Sweet home: Part 2

**A.N: Yes. I took extremely long again. Once again, no excuses. Damn it, I'm not even going to bother saying I'll "try" to speed up the updating. It just seems hopeless. Anyhow, heres a longer chapter to make up for the mere 6k words from last time. Enjoy!**

**

* * *

Day 2: Friday **

**Real World: Akyris' House**

**YAWN**

I slowly put myself up into a sitting position in my bed, stretching my arms out to relieve myself of the stress in my arms.

I feel like I'm missing something though. Someone came in my room before I decked out. Who the heck was that?

The mysterious figure who entered my room kept fogging my mind up on what he or she could have done while they were in my sleeping quarters. There could have even been more than one person.

I turn my head left to see that my computer monitor is still on and all my sites that I had up on it was gone. Maybe Lokon exited all that? He was sitting on my computer chair wasn't he?

Attempting to find out the intruder's intentions was just baffling and I eventually just give up, leaving it squirming around my mind, bothering me with a sense of intense uneasyness of not having it solved.

What could they have possibly done to my computer? Better yet, why would they even need to use it? It's not like it's special. Unless you count it sucking me into Gensokyo.

So does this mean my computer is a living object now?

My leg doesn't seem to hurt as much anymore. It's still a bit stingy and uncomfortable when I move it, but at least I can now.

Hooray for sleep! Anyone out there agree with me here?

It's about 11:21 in the morning. Lokon must be at school already. And his notes and homework are left neatly right next to my keyboard. A pretty clean intruder I guess.

**URRRGGGGHHHH**

Oh shoot. My stomach just growled didn't it? I forgot that I haven't eaten anything since that party I hosted at Reimu's shrine. I played sleep to get back at Renko which failed and I actually went to sleep later.

Breakfast is out of the question now, but I rarely eat it since I go to school so early with Lokon. It's almost lunch so I can probably leave my room and make myself a decent sandwich to at least get something in my stomach.

I remove the blanket off of me and clumsily get off of my bed, standing up slowly as to not just fall back down to my bed. Small tinges of pain enter my leg as I move it, but not to the point where I would simply fall back down to the ground if I were to attempt to stand back up.

I sort of my limp my way toward my open door, making sure to hold on to any objects that I could use to help my hurt leg.

As I walk down the stairs, I nearly trip on one of the steps, holding myself up by holding onto the stair's rails. However, my accident made a thump and I remain silent for a while.

Footsteps from downstairs start coming up and my Mom turns the corner to see me out of bed, hanging onto the rail as to not trip again.

"Akyris! You're up! What happened to you! Why were you gone for the last few days!" She bombards me with questions though I can barely register them into my mind.

"Can't we talk about this later? I'm still barely able to hold onto my consciousness." I reply to her tiredly, rather good if I say myself. I'm always ,good at acting tired, but only Lokon and Dad know that. Lokon because I pulled a good stunt on him and my Dad, I really have no clue.

I try to move past her, and she helps me down the stairs, setting me down onto a nearby couch.

"Two girls that brang you home told me that you were unconscious when they found you in the forest. What were you doing there!" She explains while scolding me for my supposed stupidness that I just went out to the forest at night.

"I don't know! I don't know how I got there or why I was there!" I lie, trying to add some exhaustion and anger for being falsely assumed that I just knew the answer.

Mom sighs then huffs for a while, trying to calm herself down as to not overreact.

**URRRRGGGHHHHH**

And my stomach cries out for food again and Mom definitely noticed it.

"Oh that's right! You haven't eaten anything since the girls found you! How about some dumplings?" Mom asks me, which makes me give her a nod. She goes into the kitchen and I'm left alone at the couch.

Dad must have left to work already. Gives me a bit more time to think of an excuse for him of why I was gone.

I'll just use Maribel's excuse and hope that he goes with it.

Tomorrow is no school, so maybe I can go visit Renko and Maribel if their at their little gap home. Or maybe not? I'm sure they have other things to do too but I really don't have anything better to do on saturday dso I might as well hop along into whatever their doing.

I can copy Lokon's homework and notes today, then when I come back to school, ask for whatever I missed.

Great, going back to school means dealing with Mrs. Onomura again. I should have at least attempted to transfer out of her damn class if I knew she was going to pick on me so much. What's her deal with me? Seriously.

And Mom comes back with a plate of dumplings! Chow time! Eat now, worry later!

She puts the plate onto the table and I waste no time grabbing one and just shoving it into my mouth.

**COUGH COUGH**

I start choking from eating too fast and I desperately grab the water bottle on the table to drown down my chewed up food.

I gasp for air as I recover from my little accident and I faintly hear Mom scolding me for eating too fast.

She pats my back to help my food go down and sits down right next to me as she notices a big lump head down throat.

School... It's such a pain right now since I have to help Renko and Maribel solve the incidents to fix up that screwed up gap. Mom looks like she just heard the school part and a lightbulb just lit over her head.

"Oh yes! Since you've been gone for so long for some unknown reason, you should visit your teachers next week to see what you missed!" She tells me, though I already was going to ask them anyway.

She goes on to talk about her younger days where she used to miss out on homework to date with Dad, but I barely listen to that. It's so dreary though...

It's almost like my ears just want to malfunction on me.

* * *

**Real World: Kimoshima University**

The halls of the university were bustling with people from around the teenager age with the occasional professor passing by. Maribel and Renko are within that group, but they break apart to enter an empty classroom that would be for their club use.

Renko closes the door and just sits down in one of the student chairs while Maribel sits next to her in another chair.

Renko sighs from the disappointment of not having anyone being interested in their "necromancy." Honestly, it was just a club to investigate spirits and haunted places.

"Our second year in university and we still don't have anyone else in our club except us Maribel. Gahhhh!" She says, tilting back in her chair periodically.

"Well. Not many people are interested in investigating spirits Renko. I honestly don't know how our club is still running when we haven't been able to have anybody join our club." Maribel replies, trying to comfort Renko.

"Its only a matter of time before the school board decides to shut us down for lack of members." Renko sighs, not being able to think of any solution of how to keep their club back up.

"What do you think we should do?" Maribel asks, joining Renko to try and think of how to save their after-school club.

Suddenly, Renko lifted her head, a smile gracing her face as she thought of a good solution to save their club. As long as they were able to get one person to join their necromancy club, they would be able to keep the club going.

Maribel seems to have caught the smile on Renko's face, not knowing why she was smiling.

"Do you have someone in mind Renko?" Maribel asks, curious as to who the person joining would be.

"Yeah. I think I do." Renko replies, smiling even further.

"Is it Akyris' friend?" Maribel continues to ask questions.

"You'll see!" Renko answered, gesturing for them to leave the classroom and out to leave Kimoshima University.

* * *

**Real World: Akyris' House**

Finally, she's done talking about her little past. Geez, I tried explaining to her that I would go back and get all my work together, but I guess she just wants to get her point across.

Mom looks like she's calmed down a little bit, so I guess she's through with my little disappearance. Until my next one that is.

She heads upstairs, leaving me alone on the couch again to mind my own business and leave my thoughts to myself.

Maybe I can leave my house to go out and do something. I don't know what to do out there, but just sitting here is boring as hell.

**DING DONG!**

I barely notice my doorbell ringing and I pass it off as a hallucination.

After a while though, the doorbell rings again and I struggle to get up from the cough and limp over slowly toward the door to open it.

**CLICK**

I unlock the lock and twist the knob to open the door...

only to see Lokon, again.

Oh crap. He might try to ask me again about Renko and Maribel. I better get him out of here before he does that.

"Haven't you seen me enough yesterday? And plus, shouldn't you be at school?" I ask him, eager to prevent him from entering my house to ask any more questions about either Renko and Maribel or where I was when I "disappeared."

"It's lunch. I just left to go visit you and this is what I get?" Lokon puts up this pout on his face and I get the urge to just slap him right here.

"Ok well now that you've seen me again, you can go back to school. Ok. Bye!" I say quickly and attempt to close the door as to not have him respond.

"Oh! Lokon! How nice to see you!" I hear my Mom call from behind me, making me grip the door even tighter and stop myself from closing suddenly.

Oh no...

Lokon uses this opportunitiy to push the door open and get past me to get in the house before I try to force him out of the house.

"Hi Mrs. Nanoko! Nice to see you!" He replies as I shut the door, losing all hope of getting him out of the house.

"Would you like a dumping?" Mom offers him, turning towards the kitchen.

"Sure!" He answers back excitedly. What a damn freeloader.

He follows Mom into the kitchen, leaving me alone to lean against the wall to support myself from hurting my leg too much.

I notice our clock up on the wall, with its hour hand at 12 and the minute hand at 47. He probably has about 15 minutes left. Maybe I can fool him here.

I take the clock off of the wall, turn it around and change the minute hand to 59, making it 12:59.

The clock goes back up on the wall quickly from me and I hurry and sit back down onto the couch to not look suspicious.

After a few moments, Lokon comes back out with his mouth full and a dumping in his right hand with Mom.

She peers at the clock and panics at what time it is. She should know the entire schedule for our school so if she forces him out, it could work out too.

"Lokon! Lunch is almost over! You better hurry back to school!" She says as she pushes him along towards the front door, making me smile internally.

"Wait wait! I wasn't even here that long! Just let me-" And thats as much as he gets out before Mom cuts in on him.

"You only have 3 minutes until lunch ends Lokon! You can come back to visit Akyris after school, now come along." She says, forcing Lokon along the floor to the door.

She opens it and quickly urges him to hurry back to school.

"But I don't think that-" Mom decides to cut him off here and reply with a "Have fun!"

And she shuts the door, leaving him in front of it with a big fat open mouth.

All right it worked! If I can keep any information about Renko and Maribel away from him, the less he'll know about our little situation. No point pulling anyone into this as well even if I need all the help I can get.

I force myself up and move over to the window to take a look to watch Lokon walk back in the direction of the school.

Sorry Lokon, but having you getting involved with Renko and Maribel might drag you into my situation too so the less people that get pulled in, the better.

But now that hes gone, I'm already bored again. Maybe I should ask Maribel and Renko whether I can go back into Gensokyo whenever I want to just solve the next incident. If we resolve all the incidents faster, theres a less chance that the gap will be seen.

Not this time though. This damn hurt leg isn't going to help me if I decide to leave to solve Gensokyo's next incident.

And a tinge of pain flows from my right leg to the rest of my body, almost as if to say a big fat "Screw you" to me.

uWell guess what, screw you too. At least its healing no matter what the wound wants to do to me. It'll be gone eventually. I'm guessing another 2 or 3 days before its completely healed up.

I'll just watch some TV to pass some time.

* * *

**Real World: Kimoshima University Train Station**

A train stops slowly with its breaks at the train stop where people would board and exit to exit the university or enter it. In Renko's and Maribel's case, it would be leaving the university.

They're both sitting on the bench when...

**DING DING! DING DING!**

"Renko. Wake up. The train is here." Maribel shakes Renko's arm to wake her up as she is leaning on her.

"Hmm? What?" Renko slowly wakes up from her short little nap and notices the train slowly coming to a stop in front of the bench and train station.

"It's time to go Renko. Come on." Maribel gets up off of the bench and helps Renko up off of it and they wait for the train to open its door and letting all the people exit before they enter the train, finding the nearest seats that they could.

The doors eventually close, not allowing anyone to leave the train and it starts to speed off from the direction that it came from.

The train starts off at a slow pace, eventually speeding up and rushing past the various buildings and people.

"No matter how many times we go on this train, I always get this strange stomach feeling." Renko decides to comment while looking at Maribel as she pulls out a small brown book to read.

"Maybe you sleep a little bit more Renko. It will be another 15 minutes before we reach the next stop to go back to the gap." Maribel replies, showing some concern for her best friend.

"Nah. I'm just getting excited. After Akyris helps us fix the gap, it could be our big chance to get into Gensokyo. I'm really happy that he agreed to help us even though he didn't have to." Renko answers, giving Maribel and juicy smile.

"Maybe we should get him a nice gift." Maribel adds in, lifting her head from the book and returning Renko's smile.

"Yeah we should. What would someone give to someone like Akyris?" Renko asks Maribel, hoping that Maribel would know a bit more about guys.

"Hmmm. What about a game?" Maribel says, trying to think of a good game.

"Thats not a bad idea. I don't know what game consoles that he has though." Renko says sadly, sinking the possibilty of getting a video game.

"Ohhh. I don't either." Maribel joins in with Renko with trying to think of another gift.

"Then why don't we stop by his house later to see what kind of gift we should get him?" Renko inputs her suggestion, taking off her hat and putting it on her lap.

"Are you sure? That injury on his leg looked really bad. Maybe we should leave him alone to rest." Maribel shows her concern, thinking that maybe Akyris would just be sleeping or resting.

"Nah. I'm sure he's fine. Guys like him don't like to stay in one place for long. I'll bet hes already up and walking around his house." Renko counters, trying to convince Maribel to see Akyris.

Silence fills the train for a while though other conversations flow throughout it while Maribel thinks over on whether it would be ok to visit Akyris.

"Ok. Let's check up on him then." Maribel finally decides to agree with Renko.

Renko smiles at Maribel's response, making her feel a tad bit nervous and some regret about her decision.

"Oh! I almost forgot! Who is going to join our club? You never told me." Maribel's mind clicks as she remembers Renko's previous comment of having someone become a member of their club.

"That will remain a secret Maribel! I can't spoil the surprise yet!" Renko remarks, wagging her finger to the left and right.

"Why can't you tell me yet? Is it someone I know? Is it someone from class?" Maribel tries to narrow down who this mysterious member would be.

A grin just fills up Renko's face while Maribel's just turns into the opposite. A sad little pout.

**DING DING! DING DING!**

"We will soon be arriving in Shozima town. Please remember to leave to your right." The train conductor calls out over the speakers, alerting everyone that the next stop would soon be here.

"Well. That's our stop. Come on Maribel!" Renko says excitedly as she picks up her bag and prepares to leave the train with Maribel.

* * *

**Real World: Akyris' House**

_Mokou what the hell are you doing! Don't chase Sakuya!_

_If I let her go though, she'll come back to shank us again!_

_They probably might set a trap to get you into an open area for Patchouli to snipe you down._

_Stop fighting and regroup at our base! You have enough metal to make us a weapon supply yet Nitori? We need that ASAP._

_Yeah hang on. Oh ****! Yuyuko has her chain gun on me! _

_Nitori down! Nitori down!_

_**** we lost our engineer. Its just us 8 now._

My headset was on my head as my left hand was set on the left side of the keyboard with my right hand on my mouse. All of my teammates were communicating with a mic and we were all determined to win this battle.

_Hey! We got a noob Nazrin coming in from the right side of our base! Kill her!_

And so I do. I ambush her from behind and beat her down with my fan as she can barely retaliate and falls onto the ground dead. A nice fan symbol next to my name appears, symbolizing a kill for me and a death for Nazrin.

"Ok I got her. She's dead." I speak into my headset, informing my teammates of a downed enemy.

_Nice. Ok run around for a bit to check out for any enemies. Sakuya, back Aya up while she runs around. Don't run into any open areas though. Go through the hallways._

"K. Let's go Sakuya." I call for her support and she stealths behind me as I control Aya to sprint to check for any enemies.

At that moment, our Nazrin dies from Yuyuko and her big chaingun. That Yuyuko seriously knows what he or she is doing!

_Seriously Nazrin? Why didn't you go around her? _

_Their Mokou blasted me back to Yuyuko so I got killed._

"K I see them. I'll run past them and hit them hard then when they turn their backs, backstab them Sakuya." I tell Sakuya about our little plan to kill both Yuyuko and Mokou.

_Ok. Let's go._

I hold down shift and W to make myself sprint past Mokou and swing my fan at Yuyuko at the back, making her turn around to me and prepping her chain gun.

I run past her as well and attempt to escape...

Only to get cut down by Yuyuko's intense bullet barrage.

"Crap I'm dead. Ok quick! Kill them!" I call out to our Sakuya and she manages to backstab Mokou, resulting in an instant death for her.

_Ok Sakuya. I'm coming to help you. _

_Hey wait theres a turret! Stop!_

The warning calls out too late as our Yuyuko falls flat on her face in front of a machine gun turret that the enemy Nitori set up. I swear, that smile on her face is probably ticking that guy off.

To counter that loss though, our Sakuya manages another kill from behind on the enemy Yuyuko and now our remaining players were us with 4 down and 5 left to go while the enemy had 3 down and 6 left to go.

After that little skirmish, everything goes downhill for us as we only manage to take our their Sakuya and Patchouli with our own Sniper. The Aya on their team beat down our Patchouli when she wasn't looking and our Eirin, leaving us with no healers and a loss to our team.

_Wow seriously? We got our butt kicked._

_Got that right. Their team was hella crappy too! How the hell did we lose?_

"We lost. It's a legit loss too with no one to blame but ourselves." I discourage everyone, though it was the honest truth. We all sucked. I got a kill because I ambushed the enemy's Nazrin and get cut down by their Yuyuko.

Everyone leaves the game room and I feel a sense of disappointment for dying a little too early in the battle.

Dammmmmmnnnnnn. We really got our butts kicked hard. It was a hella fun game though. No risk of actually dying haha.

Maybe I should just look for a capture the flag battle instead of elimination.

**KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK**

Hmm? Someone at my door? It shouldn't be Lokon though. Should be another hour till hes out of school.

"I'm coming in!" I hear a female, cheerful voice that I slowly recall.

My door opens up rather quickly and I turn my head over to see that its Renko that opened my door!

I nearly fall out of my chait with my headset attached to me from my ultimate surprise.

"What the hell? Renko!" I yell out from my sudden surprise and she walks into my room, closing the door as she comes in.

"Hi Akyris!" Renko greets me energetically and plops herself down onto my bed.

"What are you doing here? And where's Maribel?" I attempt to calm myself down to start asking her questions on why she was at my house.

"I came up here to visit you and Maribel is downstairs with your Mom. So what are you doing?" Renko answers and questions me on what I was doing.

"Uhhhh. I'm playing Touhou Combat Wars for the PC. Its pretty new and I downloaded it to try it out." I point out the lobby screen and when I alt-tab out of my computer, show her the program.

She takes a closer look at it, looking pretty confused at all this.

"Ok, how about I just play this and show you what it is." I alt-tab back into Touhou Combat Wars and search for another room to join.

Oh here we go. Capture the flag. That's always fun and when you die, you respawn so I don't have to worry so much about being killed.

When I join the room, the game has already started so I join in the game and look to see the only character available to me. Nazrin. Man, theres a lot of good Nazrin players yet.

I spawn in a room next to the flag which would be a blue flag in this case and instantly see a Mokou heading into the room to jack the flag.

"Hey guys. We got a Mokou trying to jack the flag." I announce to my teammates while holding down the Crtl button to talk to them.

_Ok we can trap her then. Theres no way she''ll go into our spawn room so block that little hallway leading out._

Hey what the hell! Its you again from last game! The sniper on my side!

His screen name. Heyitssniper. Pretty damn fitting for him since hes been in my game 3 times now through the time I played Touhou Combat Wars.

Renko is looking at my screen intently as I start moving around with Mokou toward the Enemy base and flag room.

Shoot! A Yuyuko!

I turn around to show my back toward Yuyuko and blast the ground in front of me with a rocket to boost myself over the enemy Yuyuko and ally Mokou decides to go spark fire at her like no tomorrow and with her life depending on it.

I manage to get behind Yuyuko and switch to my shovel and smack the crap out of her, making her turn around to shove her face in front of a rocket that I finish her off with.

Good thing there were no Eirin's around. Yuyuko and Eirin is a serious combination. Specially of the Yuyuko can cover Eirin really well.

I run forward toward the flag on the table, taking it and start running as fast as I can back towards our home base.

I never see the sniper coming though and Enemy Patchouli headshots me with an iceball from a ledge, leaving me dead and for the Ally Mokou to pick up the flag to try and capture it.

Soon after though, Ally Mokou gets beat in the back with Enemy Aya and the flag just gets returned back to the base, leaving the Enemy Mokou free to capture the flag.

_Its OK. We still got about 7 minutes to get a flag capture._

_Dude, we've been at it for 18 minutes now, how are we going to capture it in 7 when we couldn't do it in 18?_

_... I'm a girl._

Ouch. That poor Aya must be real ashamed for picking on Nitori now.

"This seems rather fun for you. This is just a game right?" Renko clarrifies with me, continuing to watch me try and take the flag again.

"Yeah. The developers did a really good job on this." I happily say, not noticing Maribel entering my room.

"Hmm? What are you looking at Renko?" Maribel asks Renko, curious as to what she was looking at. My game.

I turn my head to see Maribel standing next to Renko, watching my gameplay as well!

Asians eyes have never grown wider as I nearly trip from standing up in surprise over my own chair!

That moment of time gets me killed by the Enemy Mokou and I end up dropping the flag, failing to even come close to capturing it.

"Maribel! Knock next time!" I yell, frustrated that she just came in my room and got me killed. Literally in the game.

Ahh screw this. No way I'll be able to focus on my game now.

I leave the game and exit the game, giving my full attention to Renko and Maribel who are both sitting on my bed.

"Well you visited me. Thanks a lot. Being stuck at home just stinks right now." I thank Renko and Maribel for coming to visit me while I was still crippled.

"It's Ok Akyris-san. It is the least we could do since you are helping us." Maribel says, making me feel a little better for agreeing to help them solve the incidents.

"Also, we want you to join our club!" Renko cuts in quickly, and I can barely comprehend what she said. A little bit random though.

A club? You guys have a club? Now this I gotta hear.

"Yeah. We own a club. You want to join? It'll be a lot of fun!" Renko happily says, but I swear I think shes struggling to say that. I wonder why.

This just sounds suspicious now. Maybe I should get some details first.

"Uhhh. What kind of club is it? How many people do you have in it?" I ask the basic questions that could easily be answered.

"It's a necromancy club! We go around into spirit infested areas and investigate about them! We have a lot of members too!" Renko replies rather cheerfully.

...

A WHAT? A NECROMANCY CLUB? DID I JUST HEAR THAT RIGHT?

Renko smiles at my surprise and it takes me a while to calm myself down to comprehend everything.

She says theres a lot of members but from I see on Maribel's face, she looks pretty damn surprised. I'm gonna guess this isn't all of it. Or I'm missing something.

It doesn't sound too bad though and I don't usually have anything to do after school so I'll take this offer.

"All right. I'm in. So where and when do we start?" I ask Renko as she seems the most excited.

"Club meetings are at around 2-4PM on Mondays, Wednesday, and Friday at Kimoshima University. Its not mandatory but drop by to have some fun!" Renko answers all my questions, leaving me satisfied.

And she grabs a sticky note from my desk and writes down some instructions and the address of it.

"Here! I'll write down the directions from here to the university! You have to take a train though so don't fall asleep or you might miss the stop!" She warns me and sticks it onto the top of my monitor.

Oh yeah! You guys are in university? Should have seen that coming. Maybe I just lost track of it.

So I gotta take a train to Kimoshima? Guess I won't be walking anytime soon except to the train station.

With my height, I don't think anyone would bother asking me if I was part of the university. If they're inviting me, I'm just gonna assume that its OK to invite high school students into a university club.

As I get up off the chair to sit myself down next to Renko as well, only a slight tinge of pain enters my leg. Noticeable but not enough to make me fall down to the ground like yesterday where I had to use support.

All right! My leg is finally entering its last stages of healing.

"By the way, what do you have in mind for our first club meeting?" I ask, wondering if we had anything special to do.

"Thats a surprise! You'll have to stop by to see!" Renko answers excitedly still, leaving me curious on what the club would do.

Aww come on! Why can't you tell me? You're only raising suspense here! And I'm getting anxious.

And you have this really smug grin on your face. Looking at it now though, it's pretty damn cute... Makes me want to squeeze your cheeks.

Drifting off again. Should really stop doing that. I did not just say she was cute either. Or think.

"So do you want to see more games from Touhou Combat Wars?" I ask them, giving them my own smile. In return, they smile back and nod, helping me off of the bed and back into my chair to turn back on the game.

So a lot of time decides to pass by pretty quickly. Renko even gets to take a shot at playing Touhou Combat Wars.

To say the least, it's amusing as hell to hear her teammates yelling at her for idiotic moves like not shooting bombs at the Enemy Suika since she was Suika herself.

I just tell her not to respond to her teammates and to let her go on to what she is doing.

She doesn't get the basic clue on what to do until I finally decide to step in and guide her on how to move and shoot. I don't tell her about the different character classes though.

Her final score for her first game, 2-10 and only because she spammed sake bombs on the floor where some people accidentally ran over it and died. She and Maribel laughed pretty hard to see the Enemy Aya and Eirin fly about 25 feet into the air and land on the ground with X marks as eyes. I get a kick out of that too.

I guess Lokon decided not to stop by after school. Makes things a bit easier for me. I'm expecting him tomorrow though. That guy is too unpredictable. The only thing I can think that I'm gonna hear about is Renko and Maribel. Worst case scenario, they might be over at my house if I don't heal up so I can move around without anything bothering me anymore.

During sunset though, Renko and Maribel bid me to rest easy and to recover soon which I know I will.

Dinner just seems to past by with some good old fashion rice and decent chicken. Sounds tasty all right.

The moment I decide to go on my Instant Messenger though, Lokon decides to message me up. That was pretty damn fast.

He decides to ask me on what I did after he left for lunch and why I tricked him to get out of my house. I just say that he's hallucinating and that I just played Touhou Combat Wars.

Sure enough, he messages me hes gonna come by my house tomorrow because hes bored. Again. Is my house a playhouse for you? Well, we did some weird crap with each other for shits and giggles, so I guess for this time, I'll let him go as long as long as Renko and Maribel don't stop by.

Fate. I'm really counting on you here.

The day just ends without Lokon busting through my window and my sleep goes by without me noticing it. Dad didn't question me today about why I was gone for 3 straight days. Should I consider myself lucky? I don't know, but I should just make an excuse in case he does decide to ask me tomorrow.

Worry later. Just sleep now I guess.

* * *

**Day 3: Saturday**

**Border Between the Real World and Gensokyo: Renko and Maribel's House**

**SHUFFLE SHUFFLE**

The sound of blankets moving around goes on for a while before Maribel decides to wake up from the basking sunlight opening up through the japanese slide doors.

Maribel lets out a big yawn and slowly gets up from her make shift bed on the floor that was simply just a simple mat with a winter blanket and a soft pillow for her golden locks.

Renko stays asleep though with her clear nightgown and with the giant winter blanket covering her entire body up to her face.

"Saturday. School will start for me and Renko at 10. Renko shouldn't mind a cup of tea when she wakes up." Maribel quietly thinks to herself, going on to change out of her nightgown into her typical purple dress with a mop hat.

After she finishes, she goes into the kitchen to start making the tea, not noticing that Renko was slowly waking up from her peaceful sleep.

Renko puts on her usual hat, slowly taking the covers off of her to relieve herself from the heat of it. She rubs her eyes in an attempt to get some of the sleep out of her eyes, being somewhat successful.

She looks over to the already made bed that Maribel slept on and decides to get out of bed as well.

"Maribel are you up?" Renko asks as she stands up and leaves the room to go change out of her nightgown too and into her usual outing clothes.

"Yes. I'm in here Renko. Would you like some tea?" Maribel says as she goes back into the room where they slept with a tray of tea.

"Yeah. That sounds great." Renko says tiredly as she heads back into the room as well, kneeling with Maribel as they both take a cup.

"So why did you lie about our club having numerous members?" Maribel asks midway through, referring back to when she told Akyris that their club had many members.

"I didn't really lie about that. We have 2 people already and thats us, then we have all the spirits! Spirits exist don't they?" Renko answers which ends up making Maribel somewhat confused.

"I don't think that would count though." Maribel replies, looking a little panicked at that.

"Ahh its OK. We'll have a lot of fun with another person now!" Renko said, getting a surge of energy from the thought of finally having another member.

As they both finish the tea, they stay seated for a while, before Renko figures out the time.

"It's 9:20 Maribel. We have about 30 minutes to get to the train station then 10 minutes to get to class. Let's go." Renko says, standing up from her seated position, grabbing her knapsack as she leaves the door and later the house with Maribel following her.

As they leave the gap however, Renko's stomach growls in hunger, and she nervously giggles at that.

"Oops. I completely forgot about breakfast." Renko says nervously, scratching the back of her head to show it.

Maribel sighs and takes off her knapsack to put it on the ground to open it and to pull out a good chunk of a rice ball.

"Ooo, thanks Maribel!" She happily swipes the rice ball quickly and takes off a big chunk of it to cram into her mouth.

"Your welcome Renko. Now come on. We wouldn't want to stay after-school for being late." Maribel says, pulling up her knapsack to lead them out of the forest to walk all the way to the train station.

* * *

**Real World: Train Station**

**DING DING! DING DING!**

The train stops at a steady pace, eventually not moving at all and opening its doors to allow people to exit and enter.

In the distance on the sidewalk, Maribel and Renko sprint as fast as they can to get inside and they just barely enter as the door shuts behind them.

A groan from the train erupts, making it sound like it was aiming to block out 2 more of its passengers.

They both catch their breaths before finding 2 seats open to the far right of the train and settle down in it, relaxing and trying to regain their breaths.

"Ugghh. My stomach hurts..." Renko decides to complain here as Maribel just looks at her with a sympathetic face.

"Well you DID run while eating. That wasn't a very good idea." Maribel tells her, patting her friend on the back softly to try and ease the stomach pain.

"Ahhh suddenly, going to school feels like such a pain. We should just ditch it today and go visit Akyris. Theres no school tomorrow anyway and we'll eventually find a way into Gensokyo." Renko complains again, leaning her head back against the chair.

"We're only going to be in school a little longer. Plus we need to sign up Akyris into our club." Maribel replies, trying to persuade Renko that they shouldn't ditch.

"I know. I know." Renko says in an annoyed tone, locking her head back in place.

The train speeds off into the distance and Maribel peers out of the window to see buildings speed by, letting her thoughts fade off into into the pit of no thoughts.

It was almost hypnotizing, slowly making Maribel doze off until a bump and a voice shoved her out of the pit, making her regain her thoughts.

**We will be arriving at Kimoshima University in 2 minutes. If you are leaving here, please remember to exit to your right and don't forget any items that you may have. Thank you!**

"Well. Another boring day of school. Let's just get this over with so we can go visit Akyris again! He's probably lonely again." Renko suggests as she picks up her bag and prepares to leave .

"All right. Let's go visit Akyris then after school is over." Maribel agrees with Renko and as the train door opens, they both head up into the university to class.

* * *

**Real World: Akyris' House**

**BOOOOOOOMMMMM!**

_Yeah! Eat that red team! How do you like them apples! Woo! Good job team!_

_Woohoohoohoo! Eat that *****! You hear that Red team!_

I just remain silent as the victory screen shows up and my teammates and I leave the game back to the lobby. He did not just say that.

There was this one particular moment about our ally Patchouli too.

She kept blasting this Yuyuko and I'm sure she got her in the knee, the arm, the neck, and shes just taking it like a champ.

I think I could hear the guy saying I'LL NEVER GIVE UP. Sad to say, but that doesn't happen in games cause her HP dropped and Yuyuko died right after a headshot. Actually, I don't think anyone could survive a headshot.

I think I'm done playing Touhou Combat Wars for a while. I can't sit here and game all day. Well I can, but I rather not.

You know, thinking about it now. I never visited Renko or Maribel before. Maybe I should do that. My leg is back in good condition and I think I'll keep it like that. No school today but they might have it today.

Yeah. I think I'll go. I look tall enough and I could probably ask someone if they have class today or something.

...

There's a really bad smell somewhere.

**SNIFF**

UGH! ITS ME WHO SMELLS! I NEED A SHOWER! I FORGOT THAT I DIDN'T GET TO TAKE 1 BECAUSE OF MY CRIPPLED LEG!

And so I go. To clean and erase this foul stench. Yeah. Water is a little black but it could have been worse I think. It feels really good against my skin though but when I first enter, I flinch away from the hot water until my body adjusts to the heat.

Now I'm ready. Lets see, cell phone, bottle of water from the box, some money, house keys, jacket for extra pockets since I can't carry all this with only 2, the directions that Renko left on the sticky note... I don't think I'm missing anything now.

I head downstairs towards the door and get caught by Mom.

"Akyris? Are you going somewhere?" She asks me, though I know shes just curious as to where I'm going.

"Yeah. I'm going out to go to see Renko and Maribel." I stop right in front of the door to turn around and tell her what I was going to do.

"Oh? Going out to see 2 girls? Have fun!" She giggles a little bit before waving me good-bye.

Don't get it wrong ok? Haha. Well, at least shes not questioning me about it.

I wave her good-bye too and exit the house to head towards the train station.

Going on the sidewalk, going on the sidewalk.

I'm starting to see some train tracks now! Must be getting close.

Sticky note says to take the train station and board it to get to Kimoshima University. It should take about 15 minutes or so, so I don't think I'll fall asleep. My teammates on Touhou Combat Wars already scolded me for that.

At that moment, a train rushes right past me on the rails, speeding off into the distance, making me realize that it might be the train that would head to Kimoshima University.

Ack! That's gotta be a train to Kimoshima! If I don't speed up, I'll miss it and might have to wait for who knows how much time and I really will fall asleep from boredom!

I start sprinting as fast as I can in the direction that the train is going, attempting to ignore the incoming rib cramp.

Soon, it becomes too much for me and in an attempt to temporarily remove it, I take one hand while running and squeeze the area where it hurt the most, pushing more pain into it and after a while, the cramp disappears.

Its only gonna be gone for a while so I attempt to run even faster, creating a burning feeling in my legs. The bad kind.

And sadly, a transportation electronic vehicle will always beat a running human. I start tiring out and it goes ahead to start going at a rapid speed.

My breath becomes heavy and I'm stuck to doing a jog, watching the train go off into the distance though not so I can't see it.

Eventually, it starts slowing down and in my sight, is a sitting bench where people would sit to board the train.

Thank god finally! Anymore and I would have just went down from exhaustion!

Its opening its doors! Ack! I'm not gonna make it! Maybe!

I reach the train, blowing all my energy, managing to fit myself through the door, only to get the very bottom edge of my pants stuck in the door, just barely missing my feet though that makes me fall flat on my face onto the train's flooring.

"Agh!" I fall down, not reacting fast enough to stick my arms out to support myself, ending up flat on the floor.

A woman helps me off of the floor asking me if I was okay first and I give her a quick "yeah" before letting her grabbing my arms and noticing the door thats closed all the way with the bottom edge of my pants.

Wow. Just wow. Now I'm stuck. If I try to get out of the door by pulling, I might rip my pants and I don't want that. If I move too far, I'll just trip again.

I just sigh and try to regain whatever air I lost from sprinting as the woman helps me up, letting me use her shoulders as support, telling me to grab the nearby pole to grip onto. Then she takes an open seat right next to the pole I'm grabbing onto.

I go ahead and grab it as she tells me and I quickly get nervous with the looks I was getting from the various people around me.

"Where are you going? Its obviously important to you if you were willing to get your jeans caught in the door." The woman asks me. She has straight brown hair that goes down to the middle of her back and shes wearing a coat. Its not really that cold even though theres no direct sunlight. Her hair is dyed though I think.

Shes wearing a set of jeans and I dare not look at her upper body area even though its covered really well.

"I'm going to Kimoshima University to go visit some friends at the next stop. How about you?" I answer her, satisfying her curiosity for the moment and ask her the same thing.

"Friends? It really is a lovely thing. I'm going downtown to meet someone." She says really vaguely and in this weird way. I haven't really been in downtown too often.

"They are huh. Thanks for helping me when I fell down." I thank her in a thankful tone, struggling a little to bow my head due to the little room I had.

"Your welcome dear." She says calmly without saying another word after.

Hmm? I got this shiver down my back. Is someone following me?

But no one could have possibly followed me since I was the last one in the train. The door closed right after and I even got stuck in the door.

Nah, I'm probably just overreacting. Right?

"Is something wrong?" The woman questions me, giving me that curious face again.

"Nothings wrong. Just a bit tired. I got crippled in my leg for a while and its been a while since I left home." I told her. So in a way, I'm recuperating.

"Crippled? How?" She asks, really surprised with her eyes wide to show it.

I don't think I'll see her again so I guess I can lie here.

"I uhh. Fell down some stairs." I answered lamely, turning my face down to the steel floor to act ashamed of it.

It looks like she feels guilty for leaving me to stand up. I don't really blame her I mean, I'm stuck too tight to really get out..

"Ahh don't worry about it. Its not your fault I came a bit late to the train and got stuck. I'm sure I said it already, but thank you. " I try to comfort her and give her a bright smile. I feel like I'm doing this more often now.

She doesn't say anything but she smiles at me too before I hear a phone call from her.

She looks down at her coat pocket for a second, but chooses to ignore it and ask me another question instead.

"How old are you? I never got your name either." She questions my age, looking at me closely.

I guess I can tell her. No real harm in telling her.

"Well, I'm Akyris. I'm 17 years old in high school." I tell her honestly, not really minding that she knew.

"Akyris. Pleasure to meet you, even though it was in a strange way. I'm Lena. 27 years old." She repeats my name before giving me hers and her age too.

She shakes my hand and boy does her hand give me a shiver down my arm. Its pretty cold.

Damn. She has this aura that just makes me want to tell her what the heck I experienced over the past few days.

Looking at it now, my life just went into a spiral after I decided to jump into Renko and Maribel's life. 3 days of 7 whole fights with 1 shrine party after the sixth one. Its like that lifetime adventure that bored people look for. You just don't know when its going to show up. I guess I got mine except that I'm up against who knows how many Touhou Characters who are all battle ready and ready to beat down anyone who comes.

"Are you a gamer?" I turn to ask her, hoping to raise a topic with her and cut down the awkwardness that just formed.

"Why yes! I am!" She sounds excited. Cool! Now I just hope she plays the kind of games I play. I don't really see too many females that play FPS games.

I don't mind if she plays Touhou either! I see some people play Touhou in the library by using a USB that has the game attached to it which is pretty neat.

"Really? What do you play?" I continue to ask the gaming line of questioning, getting excited.

"Have you heard of Touhou Combat Wars? The new FPS game for Touhou fans? I'm playing that mainly right now. If I don't play it though, I'm OK with any RPG." She answers and her voice just clicks a memory.

"Whoa I play that too!" I lose control of my excitement, going ahead to outbursting, making some people around me stare at me. Some in annoyance, some in anger but mostly annoyance.

Oops. Guess I got a bit too excited.

"So who do you play as?" I ask her, and she sounds excited too.

"I don't mind playing anybody. But I usually try to get my hands on Nitori! Its rather fun when my turret takes out someone who turs the corner!" She answers happily. She really enjoys her job as Nitori! Its pretty damn easy to tell!

**DING DING! DING DING! **

**We will be arriving at Kimoshima University in 1 minute. If you are leaving here, please remember to exit to your right and don't forget any items that you may have. Thank you!**

"Ack! I didn't get your in-game name! What is it?" I quickly ask her before I would forget.

"Do you have paper?" She conveniently happens to grab a pen from her coat pocket.

"Uhhh just write it on my hand!" I tell her, sticking out my left hand.

And so she does. She writes pretty damn clear too.

She finishes just on time as the door opens up.

"Thanks! I hope I'll see you on soon!" I get up to leave and I rush out the door, waving at her before I exit the train.

* * *

**Real World: Kimoshima University**

Well. I found a fellow player for Touhou Combat Wars! Awesome! Now I don't feel so lonely playing it even though its really fun.

I'll play with her later though. Now! I'm finally at Kimoshima University! It sure is really big. Its the closest university near my house though and it doesn't look like a bad place to go to.

Maybe I can ask a teacher that doesn't have class. Or I'll just ask another student.

Theres one right now! Just came out of the building.

"Hey! Excuse me!" I dash off toward the student that just exited the building and I stop in front of him.

"Do you know where I can find Renko?" I ask the brown haired man.

"Renko? You mean Renko Usami? President of that weird cult club?" He asks me to clarify for him.

Renko Usami. I forgot, I never got her full name. Weird cult club. Thats the real identifier for me.

"Yeah thats her. Do you know where her class is?" I ask him again, hoping to find her location.

"Nope sorry. If you really want to know where she is, you can go head to the office and check with someone there." The man tells me before saying good luck to me and leaving.

Office. Doesn't sound like a bad place to start. There's a big fat sign that labels it in front of the building, so at least I won't get lost.

I pull one of the doors from the 2 doors open and head inside to see the receptionist not at her table.

I'm getting this feeling again. The feeling of being looked at from a spot I don't know. Its not shaking off either.

Well, back to finding Renko and Maribel.

I go ahead and head behind the desk to sit in the chair to see a window already open with a list of names that were up in Alphabetical order.

So does this mean that the receptionist behind the desk was taking attenance.

Its around 10:28. Hmm. A 10 o' clock class then.

I use the Crtl+F to open up the find window and type in Renko's name to scroll the window down and highlight Renko's name, saving me a few minutes.

Here we go. I go ahead and click her name, showing me a list of her classes and the times they were occuring.

L-6 at 10. Ok let's go then. I click another person's name and get up from the chair to leave the office.

I sure got lucky here. The office seemed empty and I found where Renko is. The receptionist must have went to the bathroom or something. Now I just got to find where L-21 is.

Yup, I have no idea where I'm going. I should have grabbed a map on the way out or something.

* * *

**Real World: Kimoshima University Classroom L-6**

Renko yawns while barely paying attention to the lecture her teacher was giving.

She sighs as she can barely keep her eyes open from the sleep that was going to overtake her.

Then she notices someone outside the window. Someone that looks like...

She can barely keep her surprise in as she is able to get a good look at who it is since she sat next to the window.

"Maribel! Maribel!" She whispers loudly to Maribel while poking her with her pencil.

"What is it Renko?" Maribel seems somewhat surprised at Renko's excited voice.

"Its Akyris! Hes here!" She whispers extremely loudly to Maribel, retrieving an even more surprised face from her.

"Where?" Maribel can barely keep in her curiosity as she looks out the window to find Akyris standing in place, looking around vainly to find their classroom.

They quickly turn back towards the board to check if their teacher was still writing up on the board, which he still was.

Renko finally takes out a notebook and writes a huge message onto it, waving it in front of the window to try and get Akyris' attention.

Eventually, he does turn their way to notice the notebook waving back and forth begging to be looked at. He could just barely see the words, "What are you doing here?"

He just shrugs his shoulders and waits for another reply from Renko.

Renko uses another whole paper, this time saying ,"Wait there and we'll come to pick you up."

He nods his head, understanding the message and sat down against the wall that the window was on and Renko and Maribel decide to focus back onto the board now that the teacher caught them.

* * *

**Real World: Kimoshima University**

Ahhh. All right fine. I'll wait for them then.

I'm bored as hell though. What to do, what to do.

Oh I know. Hand whistling! I haven't done that for a while.

I stick my left hand out like I was going to shake someone's hand, then put my right hand out in the same way, putting it between the first 2 lines on the bottom parts of my fingers. Lastly, I fold it into place, forming a rough shape of a sphere with a little gap open.

I blow onto the knuckles that pop out to form a low sound from inside of the gap.

Little test run. All right, lets try high pitches now.

I lift my left pointer finger high, opening a small gap at the end of the whole sphere.

Once again, I blow onto my knuckles, this time though, creating a higher pitch.

Ooo this feels great! I learned this when I was in 5th grade but I haven't done this in such a long time! Who knew it would be so fun when your bored!

Let's try doing a song. If I switch pitches fast enough, I might be able to do a song!

First a basic one. How about the classic Super Mario Bros from the NES?

All right. Here we go.

At first, I don't switch pitches fast enough to match the sudden switch in the middle part of it, but eventually. I get it and soon, it just fills me ears.

**CLACK!**

"Who are you! Stop doing that annoying whistling! Your interrupting my class!" I hear an old man screaming at me from behind from the open window that Renko talked to me with her notebook and I jerk my head back to faintly see his wrinkles since I had some distance from him.

I get up off of the floor and start running away from the window, turning around to just barely see Renko's notebook above the guy's head.

It has the letters L, B, A, R and I think another R in it. Library?

First lets just get out of here!

My run eventually slows down to a run as the teacher closes the window and I decide to just search for the University's library.

I stop at a nearby tree at its shade to get some shade and to catch some of my breath.

Where that is. I don't know. I guess its time to ask another person.

Hey its that guy again who told me to go to the office. Hes reading a textbook under the shade. Must be studying for a test or something.

Hate to interrupt him, but I think I need help again.

"Hey." I give him a good poke, making sure to be able to get his attention.

He turns around and he gives a quick "Huh?" and it takes him about 3 seconds for him to comprehend that its me again.

"Do you know where the library is?" I ask him quickly before he might assume that I didn't get to find out where Renko was.

"Ok you see that little building right there? Go past that and make a left. There should be a giant building. That's the library." He puts down his to what I think is his math textbook and he points toward the little building eventually going on to make hand gestures until he finishes.

"Ok thanks!" I thank him before walking off to the little building like the student said, eventually reaching the far side of it and making a left.

All right, the giant building. It sure looks big enough to be a library. Double doors too. Fancy.

I pull the right door open and sure enough, it looks like a library. Theres a ton of book shelves with plaques on the sides and a lot of tables big enough for 6 people, not to mention the chairs.

I hear the door close behind me, then a tap on my shoulder and when I turn around...

I just want to shout when I see that its Renko and Maribel. With their backpacks too.

"What are you doing here Akyris?" Renko whispers loudly to me. I can't really tell if she doesn't like me here or is fine with it.

"Well. Recently you've been visiting me often over the past 2 days so I thought I would give it a shot this time." I talk, slowly turning it into a whisper as I almost forget that this was a library.

"Oh... Well, thanks for coming to visit. To celebrate, how about we start our first club meeting together even though its not until tomorrow." Renko decides to do, turning around and walking towards the exit of the library. Before exiting though, she turns around and waves her arm in her direction, gesturing us to go faster and Maribel and I run to catch up with Renko.

Man. University people sure look like they have a lot of energy to run through before they get tired! Maribel sure looks tired and Renko is just a big ball of energy. And they both just got out of what I think was a boring class.

* * *

**Real World: Kimoshima University; Empty Classroom**

"And here we are Akyris! Our club room!" Renko says excitedly, shoving the door aside and going inside, giving me a view of it.

It looks like any other classroom that you would see anywhere.

Since its a surprise and sudden meeting, obviously. There's no one in the class.

Its supposed to be tomorrow but I guess Renko and Maribel could show me what they do without having to embarrass me in front of all the other club members. I don't work too well in huge crowds of people. Even just 20 of them looking at me makes me feel queasy and nervous.

"Go ahead and take a seat Akyris-san." Maribel suggests me to sit into an empty seat. Its one of those where the desk is attached to the seat.

I go ahead and take a seat and wait anxiously for what Renko and Maribel are going to do.

"Anyway. Welcome to our Necromancy club Akyris! Here, you'll get to perform unrealistic search and investigations for ancient spirits or maybe just about any ghost that we can find!" Renko says to me and goes ahead to bow to me which I return. A little formal if you ask me, but hey. I'm happy with this!

It makes me smile internally.

"Well that sounds great and all. But how do we investigate for spirits and ghosts?" I ask, almost forgetting how anyone would be able to look for any evidence of them.

"Once again. Maribel and I have a small trick to see ghosts and spirits. We created an invention for all of us to be able to see ghosts with these sunglasses!" She pulls out 3 pairs of sunglasses which all look pretty damn awesome.

Looks like one of those Terminator Sunglasses!

"Now the investigations for ghosts come about twice a month so be sure to meet at the spot where we say we're going to go!" Renko concludes to me, and I go ahead and give her a small round of clapping. It was sort of weird, clapping alone, but both Maribel and Renko smile nonetheless.

"This sounds pretty cool now!" I say excitedly, standing up and heading over to the females.

**CLACK**

The door leading to inside the classroom slides open and the person who comes in just makes my mind and heart freeze for a brief second.

"Hey guys! Mind if I join the club too?" The voice says as I slowly fear what I'm going to see.

Its Lokon! Its ******* Lokon! How the hell did he find us or know where we were!

"Sure! The more the merrier! So whats your name?" Renko accepts him with no objections.

What? Don't invite him in just like that! He just barged into our meeting!

"All right! I'm Lokon!" He walks up to her and shakes both Maribel's and Renko's hand.

He turns to look at me right after and smiles at my horrified face.

They repeat what they said to me on how they were going to find the ghosts to Lokon and Maribel gives me and Lokon the sunglasses.

Ugh... Now HES in the club! How the hell did he find us! Seriously!

"So to show you what to do, we're all going to go on a ghost investigation right now. I know the perfect place to go check out!" Renko decides to do, picking up her backpack and heading off towards the exit. Maribel gestures us to come along with a wave of her hand and a quick "Come on."

Where could we possibly go in this time of the day to go find any ghosts?

The least I would expect now would be to get a phone call asking if we busted ghosts.

We head back onto the train and all of us board it. Lokon looks a little bit fidgety and Maribel and Renko looks pretty excited.

I take some time to remove some of the surprise that I still retained from just seeing Lokon show up at the club room.

As soon as Renko and Maribel turn away to talk to each other, I decide to start my own conversation with Lokon.

"Lokon. How did you know where Renko and Maribel were?" I ask him, thinking there was no way for him to follow me.

"Easy. I used you as a signal to confirm their spot." He tells me, but it makes no sense to me.

"Me as a marker? What?" I just say, confused at his words.

"I overheard Renko talking about the club information. I got real curious about it so I snuck over to your house today in the morning and I could barely hear you say you were going to go see Renko and Maribel at the Kimoshima University. Just to confirm it, I waited at the train station to see if you would show up which you did. In a rush too I might add. There was no way that could have been planned so you were actually going to go see them. While you were running, I boarded the train and just waited in a seat until you got off which you did at the next stop. From there, all I had to do was just follow you and make sure I didn't get caught." He explains his entire plan without stopping. Only a few time to take a few breaths. I didn't even get a thought or interruption in.

Oh. My. God. You mean you planned the entire thing? That bad feeling was right! That was you on the train!

Damn. He really caught me there though. I never would have expected that. Who would? I thought I was safe from any followers since I was the last one on the train for sure. And I got caught in the door too!

"Nice try trying to keep me away from them though." He tries to comfort me, even giving me a pat on the back.

I just sigh and droop my head.

The whole train trip just becomes quiet for me after. Renko and Maribel go ahead and talk to each other. Lokon tries to jump in, but periodically looks at me, looking pretty guilty from time to time.

Finally, we stop at the train station where I entered the train and I just mindlessly get up to prepare to exit. I don't even notice the voice that yells to exit to the right or whatever. I just follow Renko and Maribel.

"Come on Akyris! Why the sad face?" Renko says to me.

"Yes Akyris! We're going to have lots of fun looking for ghosts!" Maribel voices her excitement. I thought you would be freaked out with ghosts. But, who am I kidding? These 2 girls are trying to get into a supernatural world and they invent pretty cool things.

"Its not that. Its just its Lokon. He makes a lot of observations and I'm kind of afraid he might catch on to find out about the gap." I tell half the truth. Half the truth? Shouldn't that be all of it?

Lokon is just following behind us as we leave the train and head in the direction of my house and I double-check this time to make sure hes not trying to listen on our conversation.

"Ohh..." Maribel catches on and her smile changes to a serious frown.

"Its all right. He won't be able to see the gap so we should be fine." Renko explains to us, though I still feel uneasy.

Well. Whatever you say.

"So where are we going to go find any ghosts anyway? Its the middle of daytime isn't it?" I ask Maribel, moving back to the topic of finding any ghosts.

And busting them for the fun of it. Nahhh. No proton beams to help us like the one from that movie. We have a group of 4 so we could defend each other.

"What? You thought that ghosts can't exist during daytime?" Renko questions me and looks at me confused.

Isn't that common sense?

"Ghosts and spirits can exist during the daytime. There's even someone in Gensokyo named Mima that lives next to the Hakurei Shrine!" Maribel tells me, though its hard for me to comprehend.

"Whoa whoa whoa. You mean there was a ghost right next the shrine when I lived there for a while? I didn't see her at all!" I keep myself from shouting out, but it comes out in a weird voice.

They both nod and I feel like freaking out and rolling on the floor. Not to mention I feel like I just got cursed.

"Back to your first question though. We're heading into the forest. Theres a possibility that since the gap is open, several spirits might be around the area." Maribel answers my previous question, and my mind goes back to thinking about talking to ghosts.

Ghosts in the forest. Classic? Maybe. Like a haunted forest!

Finally, Renko makes a sudden right and hops over the fence leading to the forest and tells us to follow her.

The trees just seem to engulf us all and we head into the open forest.

"Ok. Go ahead and put on your sunglasses." Renko instructs us, taking off her hat to put on her own sunglasses before putting her hat back on.

I go ahead and put on the Ghost Glasses that they gave us earlier and the whole world around me changes.

Ghost Glasses. That sounds pretty neat!

My eyesight turned slighty different. First of all, there was an aura of blue around Renko, Maribel, and Lokon. The trees and grasses around me all stayed the same and retained their color. Just a little darker from the Ghost Glasses.

"How does it look everyone?" Maribel questions us. Probably just a little check.

"Theres a blue aura around everyone. Other than that, everythng else is just a little darker than the original color." Lokon answers for me, and I'm secretly glad of it.

"Ok. That does sound about right so far. Now the blue auras around us is normal. That means its a human. If there is a red aura with the shape of anything, it means that its a spirit. Simple?" Maribel asks us to confirm if we got what she said.

"Yeah. I got it." I nod along with the message and Lokon does the same.

"Now take these walkie-talkies. You hold this button to talk and if you need anything. Just use these! We'll split up into 2 groups. Akyris, your with me and Lokon, your with Maribel. Good luck!" Renko hands each of us a walkie-talkie and shows us the button to talk.

So I have investigate the forest for ghosts with Renko. The idea kind of sounds nice.

Renko and I split off into the east while Maribel and Lokon head off in the opposite direction.

Once I think we're far enough from Lokon and Maribel, I decide to open conversation with her.

"So what do we do if we do find a ghost?" I ask Renko, curious as to what we woul be able to do with them.

"When we do. We talk with them!" She answers happily to me.

We talk with them? You mean we can hear them?

"We can talk to them. What about hearing them? How are we going to hear them?" I relentlessly ask Renko.

"Those glasses are connected to the walkie talkie. Its not just any walkie talkie. The glasses scans the air's frequency for any voice and the walkie talkie outputs the talk to you! Its my personal invention with Maribel!" Renko says excitedly to me. Well you little genius! You really do come prepared!

I hear a cough come from the walkie-talkie. Was that Maribel and Lokon?

Nah. They wouldn't press the button while coughing. A ghost?

Renko starts moving around the trees to search for the ghost and boy does she do it fast.

"I found him! Over here Akyris!" She gestures me to come to her.

I quickly rush over see Renko trying to catch up to the red aura that is floating away from her.

I rush up to it and call out, "I got it! I got it!" making a dive toward it. And my hands try to grip the little pointy part of the ghost, only missing and I land onto my chest. Renko follows up as she trips over my leg as I turn around to get back up and she lands over me.

Whether lucky or unlucky, her stomach meets my face and I take a good whiff of it.

Just the smell of it makes some blood drip out of my nose.

Oh no! A nosebleed! Augh! If Renko sees this, she might smack me again!

I move to try and wipe the blood and stop when something clicks on my mnd.

Wait! If I try to move, Renko might misassume it as a breast shot! So I'm squished between the middle of a crap sandwich!

I can't move, but if I don't wipe the blood out of my nose...

Logical thoughts are thrown out of the window as Renko struggles against me.

Aggh! Oh no! Noooo!

Blood just drips out even faster from my nose and secretly, I revel in the feelng of Renko rubbing against me as she gets off of me.

My eyesight just scans her without any logical thought in it. I just notice little details that I didn't notice before. Like that black ribbon in hair or the yellow hairpin on her red tie. I can't see her eyes though because of the Ghost Glasses.

Finally, she gets off of me, and I regain control of my thoughts and quickly try to wipe the blood, but she sees it anyway.

She picks up her hat off of the grassy floor and...

"Akyris... you..." I hear from her in an angry tone as she finds and picks up a giant stick.

**SMACK! CRACK!**

AGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

I scream in pain and roll around while clasping my stomach. The stick that she had broke from all the force she put into it when she smashed it against my stomach.

_Renko? Is there something wrong?_

I hear Maribel's voice over the walkie talkie as the pain slowly goes away.

"Nothing's wrong Mary. Don't worry about it." Renko replies over the walkie-talkie.

_Renko! I thought you weren't going to call me that again! You know how to pronounce my name already!_

"Ahh. Sorry Maribel. It just slipped the tongue." She replies happily and as she looks at me, she looks annoyed at me.

Renko sighs at what she thought I did and extends her arm to help me up which I take and I get off of the floor.

Do I dare look at the area where she hit? Yup.

I lift up the bottom of my shirt to take a look at the area where she hit it and indeed, theres a long, red, thin mark on my stomach.

Renko takes a glimpse at it and this time, she looks guiltily at it. She even comes over and kneels down to get a better look at it, rubbing it a little. It tickles and I nearly trip to show it and she laughs at my reaction.

Am I some kind of masochist cause I'm really liking this right now. All because of her touch.

I move away, getting control of myself again and she moves away too.

"Umm. Let's just go back to looking for that spirit." Renko suggests and she looks around for the spirit that got away from us right after I dived after it.

"Yeah." I reply and I follow in what we thought the spirit got away with.

We coincidentally meet Lokon and Maribel as we look around for the spirit and tell them about the spirit or ghost that we found, and as I was going to tell them about our little trip, Renko gives me a good punch in the stomach that basically just says, "You better keep quiet about that."

We split up again with the same groups though and the search goes on for a while.

We never got to find that ghost again and we just ended up leaving the forest in the evening as the sun was starting to set. All this for 1 ghost. But the excitement I got from just seeing him was awesome. I want to interact with that kind of supernatural thing!

Renko somehow tells us the time just by looking up at the sky. 6:38 PM. Yeah it really is kind of late. I skipped lunch too so now I'm just starving. Luckily for Lokon and Maribel, they had something to eat. Rice balls I think. We get to keep the Ghost Glasses too to prove that we're part of the "Necromancer," club.

Renko just pouts when they smile because they were able to eat something while we were just left with no food to go on with.

So since it was already late, what do we all plan to do? Go out for some fast food!

Oh. Its me who pays for the hamburgers too! I was the only one carrying money and Renko glared at me to do it. Are you trying to intimidate me to do it?

We don't eat at the place too. Instead, once we and when I mean we, its me, pay for the food, Renko and Maribel get this idea to head off into the forest. Why? I don't know, but Lokon and I do it anyway.

When they said forest though. They weren't very specific, and instead, they lead us to the gap between our world and the gap between Gensokyo and it! I hold everything in, even my breath to make sure I don't scream what the hell we were doing at this spot and my questions of why we lead Lokon near the gap. Sure, he probably doesn't see the gap but its still a risk.

We all sit down on the grass in the clearing next to the open gap. It just makes me really nervous.

"Calm down Akyris-san. Lokon can't see the gap or enter it without either me or Renko's help." Maribel whispers to me, but my nervousness and sweat gained somehow barely disappear.

"Don't you think its beautiful guys?" Renko says to all of us and slams onto my shoulder, grabbing it and pointing upward to the night stars.

"Uh-huh... It does." I reply slowly, taking deep breaths to just calm myself down next to our group. Lokon looks hypnotized at the site. Maribel sits on the left of Renko while I'm on the right. Lokon is in front of all of us. About 2 feet away.

I'm not looking at the stars though. I'm just looking at Renko without her hat. For a while. I feel like Lokon in the pervert mode.

Slowly but steadily, the tension I got disappeared. Slowly. Slowly. My breath pace that I didn't realize increased, jumped down too. Just like the tension. Shoulders eased and my chest stopped heaving up from the quick breathing.

This is an odd feeling. This pit in my stomach. Its not the nervousness that I got about 20 seconds ago. Its the sense of comfort. Like your just safe from everything. Nothing can touch you or disturb you. That mystical feeling. Is it once in a lifetime?

I turn my head back up to the stars and it intensifies even more. Safe. From everything. No battles. No pain. Not even the one in my leg from Alice existed anymore.

Its kind of making me sleepy. That sense too. I almost plant my face on Renko's shoulder. Almost. I'd get another shock of pain if I did that, but I'm not sure if I would even feel it at this point. Maybe just a small sting.

I decide to just keep myself awake and keep looking at the stars, taking quick glances at the group to see where they were looking every once in a while.

Finally, I just join them and look at the bright stars that were littered everywhere. The trees didn't seem to exist. It was just the bright lights in the sky.

White, yellow. 4-pointed stars. 6-pointed ones. Some were too far and could barely be seen and were merely dots in the field but were bright either way. All of them were sparkling. This time, I take one last look at our group. All at ease. Hamburgers were forgotten. Is this why Renko and Maribel took us out here? For this incredible view?

My hunger was just forgotten and I'm sure Lokon's was too. Whether Maribel or Renko were hungry, I don't know but since their not grabbing any hamburgers, I'll take that as a no.

I'm gonna sleep really well tonight. Hungry or not.

Renko manages to get her feelings back together first, announcing us that it was already past 9. I only remember walking all the way to buy food. That took about an hour, maybe less. So how long were we sitting here.

I get back up with numb legs from my sitting position and I realize. I never noticed any phone calls. At all. So when I check my cell phone, 2 missed calls. Both from home.

Renko and Maribel decide to walk me home and Lokon bids all of us farewell. They wave back to him too. Maybe having him in our club could work out. Hes the only energetic guy I know right now. Having some of that would be nice.

The walk is silent and I just keep looking back up into the wonderful reverie of stars. If Marisa could do this here, she'd be well-known in no time.

My legs barely move on their own and Renko wraps my arm around her neck to support me. Nostalgic?

Maribel does the same and I silently thank them with a smile with each of them doing the same.

"So what do you think of Lokon?" I ask Renko and Maribel.

"Hes... very interesting to say the least. We'll have to sign him up into our club on Monday." Renko answers me in a tired voice.

"Hmm. But he just barged in the club room and you let him in the club really quickly. Any reason so?" I ask both of them, but no answer returns.

"Well anyway. Hes really observant and won't miss a clue so don't drop any hints of what we're doing." I refer back to our incident solving in a serious voice.

Both of their peaceful faces drop back to serious ones too and our minds drift back to that.

As I reach home, Renko and Maribel bid me good-bye too and wish me a good sleep.

I reach into the pockets to find my house keys, barely finding any energy to find it and lift it up to fit it into the lock. I open the door to enter the house, locking the door and quietly go back upstairs into my room attempting to make no noise at all. Thats easy because I'm already tired as it is. That scene might have been great and wonderful, but its made me exhausted. Almost as much as the end of all the fights during Imperishable Night.

I open the door to my room and plop onto my bed, not caring to change at all. The door to my room remains open and I spread my arms out, allowing the comfort of the sky and safety to fill me up. That makes sleeping all the more easier.

One last thing clicked in my mind and I suddenly notice it.

THE FOOD! WHO TOOK THE HAMBURGERS! RAGE RAGE!

* * *

**A.N: My transitioning was so terrible in this one IMO. I just wanted to finish this ASAP. I'm not very good at filler writing or transitioning at all. Any advice for that would be welcomed! Some parts I felt really lazy on and just wanted to get it over with. Either way. I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and next chapter will be incident solving again! Back to the fights!**


	10. Incident 2: Mountain of Faith Part 1

**A.N: Holy crap. Month and a half. Not something I would expect at all. This is a considerably shorter chapter, though I hope you enjoy it nonetheless! I sure did! I might upload this again because I don't feel exactly satisfied at how this went. Changes could be made, though I won't say when.**

**UPDATE: Its a game, the names are going to be in the game. He didn't research it and he didn't know have to know beforehand to know the characters in the game. They are in there beforehand.  
**

* * *

**Day 4: Sunday**

**Real World: Akyris' House: Akyris**

**DING DONG! **

I hear the doorbell ring from downstairs and I rush down it to go answer it. Mom went to go buy some groceries and Dad went to go hang out with his friends I think.

**CLICK! CREAAAAAKKK!**

I see Maribel and Renko gasping for breath pretty hard and their head is leaning down with their arm against the wall next to the door.

"Guys! What are you doing here?" I ask them in a cheerful voice, though I was kind of scared for them.

"There's... something wrong with the gap!" Renko yells out to me tiredly.

W-What! Something wrong with the gap?

"What's wrong with it?" I ask the most obvious question at this point.

"We think it might be destabilizing!" Maribel says in a panicked voice as well, raising my nervous levels like crazy.

"Destabilizing? How?" I once again, ask the number one most obvious question at this point.

"I don't know. Come with us!" Renko lowers her voice for a bit, before grabbing my arm and pulling me out of the door and in the direction of the forest the gap was at.

Agh! Wait! At least let me get my balance!

It takes me a little time before I adjust to the speed that Renko is running at. She made my body lean forward and I had to increase the speed in my legs to catch up to run in a better upright position.

We reach the clearing and what a sight it was to behold.

The gap look like a malfunctioning TV screen. It was all distorted and it was moving around like it was alive.

I make a step to move into the gap, only to get stopped by Renko.

"No! Don't go in! If you do, you might not come back out!" Renko stops me by grabbing my shoulder with her arm.

That bad? Wow. What happened to this that became so bad?

"If the gap stays in the position for a while, it will no doubt be able to be seen by everyone." Maribel decides to also explain the depth of the situation to me.

Crap! Why?

Renko and Maribel doesn't know whats wrong with it either! What are we going to do!

"How are we going to fix it?" I ask the most obvious question again, but it was the first thing that came into my mind.

Maribel and Renko seems to think for a while and finally, it looks like she reaches some soft of conclusion.

"We could send you into the new incident and try to fix another portion of the gap so it stops destabilizing and stop it from growing any worse." Renko suggests to me, though it seems somewhat sudden to me.

We have no choice huh? Its the only option I can think of right now to. I solve the next incident of whatever I get sent into and fix the gap a little bit more to stop it from destabilizing any more.

"All right then. It doesn't look like we can do anything else from this point on. How do we get into the next incident this time?" I ask, vaguely remembering entering Imperishable Night from my computer.

"The same way like last time. Your computer." Renko says and I droop my head as I finally recall myself getting stuck midway into the computer.

Damn. Ok fine!

"Then lets go!" I call out and I start running back in the direction of my house.

I look back once in a while to see Renko and Maribel barely able to keep up with me and I get forced to slow down as to not leave them behind.

Finally, I reach my house and open the door, not even caring that it was unlocked, and rush up the stairs into my bedroom where my computer was.

Shortly after, footsteps rapidly head into my direction, signifying that Renko and Maribel had just come up too and they enter my room.

"So how do I enter the computer?" I ask both of them, hoping they would miraculously make it bigger so I could fit into it better.

"Simple. Like this." Maribel says as she raises her hands, causing my computer screen to blink white rapidly and eventually, it stayed in a continuous white state.

Wow. But you still didn't make my computer screen any bigger. You get to watch me get stuck.

"Good luck Akyris!" Both Renko and Maribel say to me before hugging me.

Whoa nice position hehe.

BAD! BAD!

It turns into a group hug and we all let go after a while. I climb onto the desk to slowly push myself into the computer screen, closing my eyes.

Yet again, I get my hip stuck and I feel someone grab my leg and push me even further in, eventually pushing me all the way in and I feel myself falling. As I try to open my eyes, I find myself unable to do it for some reason. Whether it was a mysterious force or not, I don't know.

This feeling again. Like last time.

My mind suddenly starts having moments of blanking out for not thinking about anything, finally leading to me just losing all feeling and sleeping, maybe fainting.

* * *

**Gensokyo: Forest of Magic: Marisa's house**

**Akyris/Marisa**

**COUGH COUGH**

What the hell? Whats with all this junk? Its so dusty too!

I open my eyes, to see a completely out of order house with books, objects of all sizes, everything here.

As I move around, I trip over a set of books, causing another cloud of dust to fly up into the surrounding house air around me.

Theres almost no room to move around here! Now wheres the exit?

I see a door and a somewhat clear path of what I think leads outside. Theres 2 outside windows so I guess thats the one.

I push through whatever items there are around, getting a solid grip on the doorknob, twisting it open, and I leap out into the open grass, feeling free and great.

Ahh sweet air! How I missed you!

I lift my head off of the grass to see a familiar blue dress and as I look up higher, a mantle around her with a red ribbon around her waist. And there was a single doll flying next to her face.

Alice? You still look the same as when I saw you as Reimu. Red headband in her hair, yup.

"I see your still having trouble moving through all your clutter Marisa." Alice pokes crap at me, and I get up off of the grassy floor.

Yeah I know.

It takes me a while to observe myself.

My hair had been replaced with golden locks with one braid on the left side of my hair and a red ribbon to go with it. My clothes were pretty stuffy to say the least. A mish-mash of white and black was all over me. My, what I think was a shirt hate white buttons on it over a white one. The black one had no sleeves while the white one was short sleeved. Honestly, I couldn't even tell which was which. My feet had white socks with black dress shoes, or thats what it looked like.

My gigantic witch hat had a white ribbon that went around it and it covered the entire top section of my head.

I'll say one thing though, the hat is really comfortable hehe.

Sadly, theres no breast shots this time. If Renko and Maribel catch me doing it this time, I don't know how I would reply.

"I ended up tripping over a set of books too, ze." I tell Alice and boy does she look disappointed.

Ack! Where did that "ze" come from?

"If you didn't steal Patchouli's books, you wouldn't have such a messy house now would you?" She replies to me bluntly.

Marisa steals books from Patchouli? How am I not surprised? Shes energetic enough and seems to have the personality to do this kind of thing.

I'm not gonna bother answering back since I have no idea who Patchouli. The only Patchouli I know is from Touhou Combat Wars, but all they do is use Touhou characters, not give any information about them except about the class they take the place of, like sniper in this case.

I have no idea where to go right now. Who would the first person to usually know whats going on...

Reimu! Reimu would definitely know! Shes got the intuition for it. Now for an excuse to go over to the shrine.

"Hey! Let's head on over to the shrine! We have nothing better to do right now!" I say excitedly, trying to fit Marisa's personality.

I have no idea whether I'm doing a good job or not right now.

Wait. I can't fly! I need Marisa's broom!

I run back inside Marisa's house, not looking where I'm going and end up tripping over the same set of books before. I can almost hear Alice sigh from my failure.

_15 minutes later..._

* * *

Finally. I found it. It was in the bedroom all along in her closet. And what do I find in her closet. More of the same clothes!

Its all right though. I got the broom, so maybe I can fly now.

Now how does this work?

I clumsily climb onto the broom, sitting at the fat end of it, ignoring Alice's confused looks at me and prepare myself to fly. So I think.

All right! Now fly!

The broom instantly lifts up into the air and I get excited at first before soaring off higher into the air at an intense speed! I struggle to hold onto the broom, leaning myself forward to keep a better grip on it and to not fall off of it!

AGGGH! WAS MARISA EVER FLYING THIS FAST? THIS IS RIDICULOUS!

STOP STOP!

And it does stop, nearly flinging me off of the broom! I barely grab onto the thin end of the broom with just one hand.

Holy ****! That was insane! What's Alice going to think now?

I take a while to get my other arm onto the broom and to pull myself up. Its like a bar stuck in mid air without it falling despite the weight I'm pushing onto it.

That was way too close! How do I slow it down? If I tell it to just go again, it might shoot off like a freaking rocket again!

Maybe it was because I got a bit too excited? Was that why? Or maybe Marisa is just used to this speed and I just don't really know how fast she really is flying.

Well, I have a higher view now and I can see what I think is the Hakurei Shrine. Theres the torii gate and the seemingless endless stairs that lead up to it.

Its pretty dead straight ahead! At least I won't have to turn. I have no idea how to do that. Or land either for that matter. I'm a dead witch err, guy.

Alice is starting to follow me, I didn't realize how far ahead of her I was. I'm sure she won't mind if I just fly ahead now.

Ok full speed ahead!

And the broom zooms off again! But this time, I'm prepared for it and I grip the broom tightly. The wind rushes against my face, making me close one of my eyes from the intensity of it. It still seems really fast and its really hard to keep myself from flying right off of my flying broom to fall to the ground.

Now, I'm not too afraid of heights, but when you're REALLY high up in the air, I think anyone would fear falling.

Ok! Reimu's shrine! Now how do I go down?

Maybe if I...

I push the broom down, tilting it at a downward angle, achieving what I wanted. Going down!

All right!

But I realize that I'm going down way too fast and if I don't stop this thing...

ACK! NO! I'M GONNA CRASH ONTO THE GROUND! STOP! STOP!

I pull the broom upward and luckily, it does stop, only to fling me straight forward towards Reimu's slide door. I crash right through before landing on the ground and rolling, stopping when I hit a wall.

"What the... Marisa!" I hear Reimu come out from the deeper room in the shrine to look at me on the ground against the wall.

Its the last thing I hear before I blank out. Blanking out seems... peaceful though.

* * *

**Gensokyo: Hakurei Shrine: Marisa/Akyris**

I force my or Marisa's body up off the floor and my eyes open, slowly figuring out that I wasn't smashed against the wall anymore. My sense of touch slowly returned to me and my thought process joined along as well. I was on a wooden floor, laid out neatly with what it looks and it looks like Reimu and Alice are having a cup of tea.

"Aggh. I hurt all over." I complain as I get both Alice's and Reimu's attention.

"Well if you didn't crash through my door, you wouldn't be in this position. How did that happen anyway?" Reimu just bluntly says to me before taking a sip of the tea.

"Ehehehe. I couldn't control my broom too well and I went too fast so when I tried to stop, I got flung right off of it and right through your door." I say embarassingly as I head over to sit next to Alice.

"Is this another one of your experiments Marisa? Because if it is, its not rather working too well is it." Alice coldly says to me. Ouch.

Experiment? What the heck is she talking about? So Marisa performs experiments on objects? Is that what shes talkng about? Only one way to clear it up though.

"Yeah! I've been trying to make it a bit faster." I say with much gusto in my voice, trying to fit Marisa's personality.

I turn to look at Alice as she sighs at what I think is that she thinks that it was an experiment if that makes any sense. Reimu just takes another sip from her tea and sighs at it too.

I take a cup of tea from the tray and take a sip out of that to join Reimu's and Alice's. To say the least, its way better than what I can make! Has she done this for so long that shes perfected tea making? It takes everything from me to hold in the smile and the compliment I was going to burst out.

Suddenly, the wind blows against Reimu's face and her neutral face switches so a troubled one for some reason.

"Is there something wrong Reimu?" Alice asks, noticing the frown quickly.

"I have a bad feeling about something. Up over on Youkai Mountain." Reimu said, pointing toward the insanely tall mountain behind the forest where I flew from. Its giant shadow loomed over Marisa's house and over most of the forest as well.

That giant mountain, if I look far enough, theres someone flying down from it at a really fast speed. All of us look at the small dot as he or she flew down the mountain toward the forest.

As whoever neared it, birds flew off into the sky and the mystery person flew just above the trees, heading toward our direction. Whoever it was lowered into the trees and all of us lost sight of him or her.

All of us just remain silent as we all finish the tea and wait for someone to break the silence. Guess that'll be me then.

"Who... who do you think that was?" I ask Reimu, still not knowing who everybody in Gensokyo was.

"I don't know. Maybe its Aya?" Reimu questions as well and it clicks back to me. Aya? The scout for Touhou Combat Wars? With fast speed like that, she definitely would make a good scout! I guess this is where the developers got the scout from.

Finally. someone zooms up right past the torii gate into the air, and lands ridiculously hard onto the stone floor, making some kind of dramatic entrance.

This new person was a female (How surprising) and had yet, another pair of white socks but her shoes were red. She had a black skirt that covered her upper thigh area to about 2 inches above her knees with a white button up shirt with a V-cut on the bottom part of it on the middle. Her eyes were red and her hair was short and black which went no further than her shoulders. Her red hat was only about fist-sized and her neck had a black ribbon around her collar. In her hands, held a newspaper that too far from my world and a 3 prong leaf fan.

Funnily enough, that looks like a modern camera around her neck! Where did she get that?

I just hear Reimu sigh in annoyance. I guess she doesn't like this girl too much? You don't seem to have many friends then Reimu. Alice doesn't look like she cares too much.

"Hey~. Why all the gloomy faces?" The camera woman raises her camera up to what I think is going to take a picture of all of us together. Alice outstretches her arm and a doll rushes past us to clasp onto its lens.

She gets the crap scared out of her and the doll jerks the camera right out of her hands and flies back to Alice. Now that made her happy face flip around.

"What are you doing here Aya?" Reimu says with her frown face. Aya's face twists again and looks pretty cheerful again, despite getting her camera taken by Alice's doll.

"Look at this Reimu! You'll probably want to see this." Aya says as she walks over to Reimu to hand her the newspaper and Reimu puts down her cup to open it up.

I lean my head to take a look at it and the big fat headline.

One look at it, and its trouble already.

Reimu's eyes grow really big at Aya's headline and she sure doesn't look happy at that.

"A new shrine? Is this a joke?" I ask, really confused on how there could be another shrine.

"No! Its not! Theres a new shrine up on Youkai Mountain, saying that you should shut down your shrine Reimu." Aya quickly explains to us and Alice gets up from her spot as well to see the newspaper.

"This isn't fake is it?" Reimu asks, looking back at Aya in disbelief.

Aya shakes her head and all of us continue reading it. To say the least, its pretty insulting.

"Well I can't close the shrine. If I do, the Hakurei Border might cease to exist. I'm going up that mountain tomorrow." Reimu says with complete confidence in herself.

Sorry Reimu, but I don't think I can let you go up there. It would be nice for you to help, but I don't think that would help me. If I don't solve this incident myself, the gap might not repair and will probably get worse. If I work together with Reimu, I might drag her down because I only know some of Marisa's attacks and still don't know how to use it and we'll both end up in bad situations.

I might have to leave early first then before Reimu goes up the mountain the next morning. Night it is then.

Well that means that I'm solving incidents that are at night 2 times in a row now.

No one will be there to watch if I fail to fly on my broom again though.

I don't know how to start Marisa's attacks so I might have to improvise if I don't learn now. On my own sadly.

And this little wooden thing in my apron. Its the thing that uses Master Spark for sure. But how does that work? Do I just call out the attack and point it at someone? Or does it eat up energy like when I was Reimu using Yin-yang orbs?

"What do you think about all this Alice? A new shrine?" Reimu asks Alice for her opinion, sitting back down onto the steps.

"It certainly sounds interesting. Why do you think they would want you to tear down your shrine Reimu?" Alice asks back while glancing at me as well.

Hey. Why are you giving me a face that just says to me to stay out of trouble?

"The new shrine is called the Moriya Shrine. I'll get some good info from the newcomers!" Aya sounds really excited to talk to them again.

All of us just sigh at that and Aya waves good-bye to us towards the mountain from where she came from. Just to be polite, I wave good-bye back.

"I don't know and I don't like it. It just sounds troublesome, but it doesn't look like I have a choice." Reimu answers Alice's question before going back into the shrine, picking up the tea tray along the way.

"Ahh! I just remembered something I forgot to do! See you later guys!" I yell out a random excuse and prepare to board my broom.

Alice's doll and herself wave at me while Reimu peeks out from the door to wave to me as I instantly burst into the sky at high speed doing my best to not scream out.

I hold on for dear life as the wind pushes against me and I use 1 hand to keep a hold of my witch hat.

Once I feel that I had a far enough distance to maybe become just a black speck in the sky. I just let all the tenseness into my thoughts.

NOOOOO! I'LL NEVER GET USED TO THIS!

Forest, forest. Where is it!

I twist my head left and right, rushing to quickly find the forest where I had came from so I wouldn't have to stay on this broom any longer.

Is that the one? Over there?

Without a second thought, I try to force the broom over to the mass of trees.

I fly at a near-straight vertical angle and as soon as I hit the leaves, branches smack onto me everywhere and I wince in pain as I struggle to hold in the pain while grasping the barely controllable broom at the same time.

ACK! GROUND INCOMING!

I shut my eyes close in response to the closing distance and my inevitable result and my broom smashes directly onto the ground. My face stops maybe about two inches above the groun without crashing for about a split of a second until my body flips forward on its own while my broom becomes stuck into the ground.

...

I gripped it way too hard. At least I didn't fling forward like I did with Reimu's shrine. That was freaking scary!

**RUSTLE RUSTLE!** **CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP!**

Hmm? Footsteps coming this way?

I roll over and slowly start to pull myself together from my sudden headache and I just stare into the area where the sound is coming from.

The bamboos get shoved aside and a girl clad in red overalls and a white shirt with maybe, snowish or a really light violet hair that just drops down all the way to the middle of her legs.

Wait a second! Red overalls...

It just clicks into my mind after seeing it.

Mokou?

"Huh? Oh its you again." Mokou says to me completely uninterested.

And just to show it, she puts her hands in her pockets.

Me again? So does that mean...that my involvement with Imperishable Night has affected here? But this is the sequel of the sequel of a game. Marisa could have went out to take on Mokou with Alice only.

I get up off of the ground to give a sheepish smile, slightly embarassed at my little failure. What am I saying? That was just terrible, I got lucky I didn't break any bones. All I got was a big dust cloud and my broom stuck into the ground. Its not broken either!

"Oh uhhhh... Hey Mokou! Do you know the way out of here?" I call out to her before she starts turning the other way.

...

No answer.

I can just faintly hear a sigh from her. She looks back at me with a bored look and beckons me over.

I pull my broom out of the ground with much effort since it was solidly stuck into it and run to catch up with Mokou before I lose sight of her. I almost tripped again too.

"So why don't you just fly up out of here instead of just walking out?" Mokou initiates the questions for me. Not a hard one.

"My broom is acting really weird and I don't think I want crash again." I answer back, before noticing that my answer didn't really fit Marisa's personality.

"Hmm? You don't really strike me as someone who is careful with things." Mokou looks back at me while continuing to walk forward with her hands in her pockets still. Reminds me of some of the people at school.

Back on track though, urgh. I won't answer this question and hope to just dodge it.

For a while, we keep on walking and I guess she just loses interest in it.

"You seem tense. Something wrong?" Mokou just blurts out to me randomly. I'm caught off guard by it.

I'm tense? And it was true. My shoulders were lifted up higher than usual and I felt like my body was pushing out.

"Nah. I'm just reminding myself of how great that, "Trial of Guts," was." I lied to her and she stops dead in her tracks to twist her head to me.

Ack! I should have watched my tongue! It was a lie, but a bad one in a different sort!

"Its something I'll remember. I never expected to lose that spell card duel to you and that miko." She kind of smiles while she says it too. I guess its better than being angry. Right?

The miko huh? Reimu? I'm kind of hoping I was in that duel then. Except it was a 4 versus 1.

And she continues walking again. I'm back to following her too.

It quickly becomes quiet except for the sounds of our footsteps.

"So... you live around here?" I dumbly ask, trying to strike up a conversation.

"Yeah. I do. Not far from here actually. Why do you ask?" She asks back to me and my mind races to improvise a response.

"Just a bit curious." I say quietly before taking off my oversized witch hat to scratch an itch covered my golden locks.

"Hows that miko doing by the way? That youkai with her didn't do much to help her." Mokou explained to me. I feel pretty happy how Mokou is showing a little bit of concern. Guess shes not so heartless after all. She confirms that my involvement during Imperishable Night has affected the events here too. It doesn't seem like it matters much, but its like making history for me.

Thinking about it really quick, isn't Keine a history teacher or something? Maybe shes got it recorded or something.

I get shoved out of my thoughts when Mokou announces that we're at the exit.

"Thanks Mokou! I probably would have been stuck here for a long time without your help!" I thank her and start running past her to the grassy field and out of the bamboo forest.

She doesn't say anything and just turns around to go back into the bamboo forest. Quiet girl. Even though shes what, over 500 years old I think? Not too sociable.

All right, now which way to the Forest of Magic? Should I fly again? I'll end up spinning around recklessly and crash again though.

URRGGHH! GOD DAMN IT ALL!

I'm back to walking then. If I remember I think, the human village was that way? The east?

I remember going into the bamboo forest as Reimu. I had Yukari that time though and it just more or less left me following her rather than the other way around.

I look at the sun for a moment, to kind of judge the time. About 50 degrees into east. It'll become sunset soon. I don't think I'll be able to make it back to Marisa's house anytime soon.

I guess its a bit more discreet then. I can just head directly to the mountain then.

Its huge for that matter, I don't think I can possibly go in the wrong direction.

So I go ahead and start walking in that direction, unconsciously grabbing the little wooden thing in the apron. Clasping my hand around the smooth wooden surface of it, gave me a slightly warm feeling in my feminine fingers, despite the cold wood. Like it was kind of resonating with me.

The way to the mountain doesn't seem to pass through the human village. No youkai really seems to go the village too. Makes me feel less safe. I don't remember any specifics of Marisa's attack except for the Master Spark. How could I possibly forget that? The searing pain that came with it too!

Maybe it'll come naturally again! Like with Reimu's Sanctifying Orb!

Yeah right, that's some wishful thinking. Its hard not to hope with that possibility there though.

The dirt I was walking on disappeared to be replaced by grass now, no longer kicking dust up into the air and instead crushing it to the floor.

My own thoughts were shooed away as my eyes finally regained its focus to almost find myself almost running into a tree.

Really better watch where I'm going.

**KSSSH! KSSH!**

Wh-What the hell was that sound? From the sky?

Sure enough, a small part of the sky darkened to the point that the clouds were even black and blue lightning circled at that small area. It was spontaneous though, quickly shifting between a light blue color and the dark black sky. The clouds changed rapidly back and forth too, becoming either white or black. There were even some hybrids of both colors in there.

What is that? It doesn't look good at all!

Maybe, its this instability Renko was talking about? She said the gap was unstable. Could this be the effects for it?

It doesn't seem right though. Could be. its a definite possibility. All the more reason to hurry up and resolve this incident. Theres no time to wait for tomorrow.

I start walking faster toward the mountain, enough to be considered a light jog. I really hope that nothing too bad is going happen. Its almost like a bad sign. And its making me get the chills, even with these layered clothes.

* * *

**Real World: Forest Outskirts: Renko and Maribel**

"What are we going to do Renko? We can't just simply wait for Akyris to finish resolving the incident." Maribel asks with uncertainty and concern in her voice.

"I don't know. If we can't find a way to fix the gap even a little bit, he might get stuck in Gensokyo even if he resolves the incident." Renko says, clearly trying to keep a calm tone in her voice.

"What if... what if he does get stuck there?" Maribel asks, even more worried than before if they failed to do something about the gap.

There was no answer between them. None of them wanted to imagine what would happen if he did get stuck there.

Certainly, no one would ever want to shoulder the guilt they would feel for leaving him forever trapped in Gensokyo.

"So... how are we going to fix it?" Maribel asks, attempting to hold her voice together.

"I...I don't know..." Renko concedes quietly, unable to think of any idea.

"Wait, what about an invention?" Maribel questions hopefully, raising Renko's hope momentarily.

"An invention? To fix the gap? It could work... No, we don't have enough the time to build another one. I'm not even sure if we could have the parts needed." Renko says sadly, going back into a thinking state.

The desperateness of their mind grasped at any living hope. It was a dead end for Akyris either way, whether he resolved the incident or not. After all, they only had so much time left.

"A reprogram then? What about a reprogram on our old invention?" Maribel exclaimed, hoping that it would provide some use.

"On our old gap-breaker machine? Good idea! Let's do that! Its broken, but the energy chip that we put it in can be reversed to repair too rather than just breaking boudnaries!" Renko said excitedly, smiling at their newly found plan.

"Ok. Quick, lets go get it! The less time we use, the better. I left it behind a couple trees back near the gap." Maribel said, running off into it in the direction of the gap.

Renko follows as well, and they pass by the gap which is by now, sparking even more than before. Lightning coursed through the insides, allowing no one to enter at all.

Maribel splits away from the straight path and instead, starts rapidly walking around to search for the broken machine. Renko follows suit, looking for any signs of it.

"I found it!" Maribel yells, and Renko stops to run toward the direction of Maribel's voice, finding her kneeling at a mid body size, pieced of machine.

It was square shaped, much like a cube with a little red switch on top . Several parts of it were missing from the failed use of it to open up a clear path to Gensokyo by breaking through tbe boundaries.

Renko clicks a couple of the charred green buttons, looking like she was rapidly just mashing buttons randomly, and a small green screen faintly appeared with jumbled, unclear words on the center-top area of the spehre.

"Wow! Despite exploding, it looks like even though it exploded, it still works!" Maribel says, happy that their luck was now getting better.

"Not exactly, its too beat up to be used anymore. I'm going to need parts and tools to put this thing back together. I need to open this up and go ahead and rewire everything and fix any broken boards and chips in it. Otherwise if it fails, it might explode again and it'll probably just make the gap worse." Renko explains about her analysis on the broken cube shaped invention.

Maribel's smile quickly flipped into a frown.

"All our items are still in our house in the gap though. Its impossible to even enter in its state." Maribel includes even more bad news along with it. Just when things were starting to look bright.

"Lets just get the basic tools first then. Then I can judge whats too badly damaged and what can still be used then." Renko says, turning back towards Maribel.

"Well, where are we going to get them?" Maribel asks her, leaving them both clueless for a moment.

"Try Akyris' house! He has to have something in there!" Renko exclaims and Maribel decides to respond with a joke.

"We do seem to always return to that place huh Renko?" Maribel flashes a smile to Renko to have her laugh a little bit.

"Thats not funny Maribel. This is kind of urgent you know!" Renko found it hard to stifle the giggle anyway however.

About a couple minutes ago, they were seeking whatever answer though could find worriedly, and now that hope had shown up, they were back to poking fun.

There was time for that later though. Akyris' life was in their hands indirectly.

Maribel starts sprinting off out of the forest without looking back while Renko continued to gaze at the machine.

"I hope this works." Renko said to herself, setting down her backpack to pull a small screwdriver out.


	11. Incident 2: Mountain of Faith Part 2

**A.N: Hurray! I'm not dead! Yet. Don't really have anything else to say honestly. Just that gaming has gotten the best of me. I hope you guys enjoy this short chapter!**

* * *

**Gensokyo: Youkai Mountain: Akyris/Marisa**

Well, finally almost at the mountain. Its a freaking long way up too.

The towering mountain leaves a giant shadow over the trees from the suns angle, giving it the sense of enormous height.

Looking back up over to the disfigured area in the sky with the blue lightning surging through it gave the shivers down my back.

Is it getting bigger? It looks like that since I went farther away from it!

All the more to hurry up and resolve this incident.

The trees somewhat block my path as I quickly walk to the Youkai Mountain to hurry and reach the top of it.

The final boss has gotta be up there. Gut feeling.

Should I just take the broom and fly up there?

...

I don't think thats a good idea. Screw that.

My mind mentally sweats as it agrees with me and sends memories of the two crashes I already had with the broom. I shudder at the thought of going ahead and crashing again.

Third time is the charm they say? Usually, it still fails for me anyway.

...

The winds are blowing at an intense rate all of a sudden, making me hold onto my witch hat to prevent it from flying away.

Orange leaves swept by and looped quickly through the air with the flow of the chilly wind.

It wasn't a big problem though with this huge witch getup. Its pretty damn warm in this.

The clouds were lazing idly, with almost no movement at all, not seemingly caring about how pushy the wind was.

Suddenly though, a complete mass of autumn leaves cover up my view and I on instincts, raise my arm to cover up my eyes to prevent it from being poked by the wild leaves.

Many of them rushed past me, and fairies quickly sprang from the sky, quickly opening fire upon me.

I guess I'm an intruder! I should've expected this, but its stage 1 I think. Should be no problem.

Maybe it was me, but the fairies seem to line up into position, all of them raising their arms to fire small green arrow tipped bullets toward me, though very slow.

Ha! Too easy! I stop walking and just quickly observe for any holes in their line of fire. Too many to count. I can make it through that one over there!

I break into a run, slowly going faster and slip through the line of fairy fire. I don't even bother to look up as their shooting me. Their bullets are just too slow.

But how do I fire back? I still don't know how to shoot as Marisa!

Broom-twacking it is then!

I push off the ground to give myself a high boost into the air and as I prepare to do the second jump, I accidentally burn up too much power, instead, rocketing me upward in a 57 degree angle, straight into the field of fairies.

The wind and gravity didn't even bother to push me back down as I grip my broom with both hands behind me to prepare to smack one of the fairies to their doom and...

**CRUNCH!**

Oooo Ouch. I swung my broom in a sideways slash motion and kind of missed the body, hitting the head instead, launching the poor fairy victim higher into the air.

Great, one down! Only a countless army more to go.

I land on my toes. Someone told me that if you land on that instead of on your whole foot, you can ease some of the pain when you land. Looks like it works too. Thanks person who I refuse to name because its personal! (For reals)

As I take one look at how many fairies there were completely demoralized me, draining my rush of energy along with the enthusiasm and pleasure I felt from launching the fairy with my broom.

Should I just run through then? I can't just let them freely shoot me though!

Bullet wave incoming! Maybe I can deflect with Marisa's broom like with what I did with Reimu's gohei.

I grip my broom again and slash up above me in a sideways fashion. Some of the bullets somehow dissipate against it, but most of them deflect back to the fairies direction.

Most of them just move aside, but I least I know I have a way to defend myself. Strange way to do it, but it works.

One of the fairies stupidly comes closer. I don't know why, but another fairy gone is one less firepower on me.

Homerun!

**SMACK!**

Oh yeah! Rush time!

I strangely feel excited and run a little faster than what I was running at.

Another one of the fairies mimics what the previous one did, flying straight to me.

I swing my broom again, only to miss as the fairy flies upward. And just to mock me, she puts her pointer finger right below her eye and pulls it down while sticking her tongue out at me.

Oh hell no!

She moves closer again and I take another broom swing at her taunting face. To my dismay, she does the exact same thing as before. Fly up to dodge it and mock me again with her tongue out face.

The other fairies were starting to approach me as well, most likely to probably do the same as the first one.

Damn it! Eat this!

**WHOOOSSHHH!**

Failed broom swing again, and this time, they all laugh at my failure.

I don't notice it as my hands held onto the broom even tighter, but the straw, thicker end of the broom grew a small white sphere. I was only facing the fairies, still ticked off about how I was still unable to reach them.

Anger about their mockery of me fueled my swing it this time and as it cut down the center, star shaped bullets emerged from the sphere of light, going in the same sideways arc direction I had swung my broom.

All the fairies that were directly above of me were struck by the numerous multi-colored small star bullets that had appeared at my third swing of my broom.

My quick anger quickly disappeared as it had appeared and was replaced with realization on what had just happened.

What the? How did that happen? Why didn't it shoot star bullets earlier when I swung it before? What did I do different this time than the other times?

Most of the fairies that weren't hit were baffled at what had happened to their fallen comrades.

Soon, they retaliated with their own green bullets, the exact same as they had initially shot.

Let's try shooting again!

I slash the broom above my head sideways again, only to have absolutely nothing come out.

God damn it! Failure! Come on! Swing again!

I swing my weapon again in the opposite direction, merely deflecting the bullets away from me. Gut instinct tells me that the fairies are going to fire again. It turns out wrong though, and the fairies fly up higher, completely out of my range.

This time, a figure loomed and jumped from above the fairies. They parted aside to allow what I think is their leader to land in front of me.

Dramatic landing. Some dust rose up when she landed.

I stop jogging to look at this new person who is probably a female. Again. Catching my breath here is a good idea too.

Wait, what the hell? How long did I jog?

The random thought quickly disappeared as this girl lifted her short golden colored hair with a red ribbon in it.

She wore a twin colored dress. It reminded me of Maribel's dress, though this new girl's was red on top with black buttons lined up in the middle and a purple collar. The bottom of her dress was colored orange with leaf designs on the bottom.

And now for the first question that just popped into my head.

"Who are you?" I ask, loosening my hold on my broom, planting it onto the ground with 1 arm.

"I'm Shizuha! Shizuha Aki!" She says to me with this happy grin on her face.

The fairies just decide to leave her and all fly away from the soon-to-be fighting grounds.

So is this the first boss already?

"I'm here to stop you from taking away autumn!" She says with confidence that she'll defeat me.

...What?

"Take away autumn? What are you-" is the last thing I get out before she goes straight into firing small circle bullets. 3 waves of them. The first 2 were yellow while the last one was red.

I can get through these. I still don't know how I fired all the star bullets from before, so lets try close-range combat. It doesn't look like she can fly like the others. I'll take advantage of that.

I rush toward her onslaught if you could even call it that. Each wave was no less then 6 minor sphere bullets. I eventually closed the distance upon us and give her a nice punch to the face.

She takes it and tries to point-blank shoot me, but I give her a solid punch to the gut with my right arm, shattering what little resilience she had, making her bend over in pain.

Here we go! The Marisa version of my uppercut!

"Shorybroomken!" I hold my broom with both hands and slash upward, launching Shizuha upward a good distance and once again either by myself of instincts, I jump up after her.

I jump up past her body and raise my broom over and past my head to deliver a crushing blow downward to Shizuha, putting my full weight on it to increase some of the force on it.

She falls back quickly right back down and manages to keep herself from crashing onto the ground.

She floated! I didn't know she could do that.

I land by on my toes and hold my broom in a fighting position with both hands on it, readying myself for whatever attack she would do next.

She spreads out her arms, I guess to draw power to herself and fires out actual red bullet shaped bullets, put in a formation of the edge of a sword.

Not too many of them. I can just go around them and trash her again.

I start running in zig-zags to Shizuha again, making sure to keep my distance away from the bullets she fired at me.

As I near her, she stops shooting for a moment.

Well if you stop shooting, then I'll just take a hold of that opportunity!

Once I reach melee range however, she lifts her arms in front of her and I cannot help but flinch at what Shizuha was going to do.

I get blasted back, feeling first a sharp pain on my chest, then blunt force and once again, I can't help but close my eyes as I roll backwards, unable to control my movements until I finally stop with my chest on the ground and my back face-up.

The urge to cry in pain was almost irresistable, but I managed to simply stand back up with only a couple scratches here and there.

I grind my teeth together, holding my intimidating gaze at Shizuha, determined that I would get payback.

Damn it though. She tricked me good into thinking she wouldn't attack.

Before I even charge again, Shizuha decides to run off in the direction I was facing.

"Sister~!" She cries out, lifting her arms into the air like she was being chased by some inhumane monster.

Now that just hurts mentally.

One less boss fight to deal with I guess.

Within moments after Shizuha leaves though, someone flies furiously toward me before I begin to walk and I start fearing for my life.

The new girl lands dramatically and looks pretty angry at me.

Wait a second... Why does she look younger than Shizuha? She decided to send her younger sister on me?

Despite her innocent little red hat and a dress that was yellow on the top half and black on the bottom half, it was an angry sister. I can almost relate to that.

Ack! Oh shoot. Oh no...

It's that sisterly look! That look the sister of whoever gives you this look like a glare where you can literally feel the slight tinge of the etch of death against you!

I remember seeing that one time with Lokon... I still shudder to at that...

Its all fricking too much! I can't take it!

...

_/cower. You cower at the sight of Minoriko._

I take a small peak from my feared pose at this new girl which I assume is Shizuha's sister and by the looks of it, looks confused at what I'm doing.

Haha! You let your guard down! My turn to attack!

I break out of my false stupor and instantly push my feet off against the ground to rush toward the new girl at what I think is high speed, intending to land the first blow on her to get a start-off advantage.

I feel slightly tingly as the wind blows against me, though the weak friction has no effect on my determination land the first hit.

She jumps into the air away from me though and aims her arm at me, but I have absolutely no intention of giving her the chance to shoot me!

I boost up into the air after her and force her to lower her arm and make her continue to fly away from me to avoid up-front melee swings.

Hell no! Not letting you get away!

I force another shot of energy into my feet to boost myself diagonally toward the runaway girl, having absolutely no success on catching her.

I didn't notice it. But slowly and slowly, even though I didn't realize it, I was already losing the battle.

Ahh... I feel so weak all of a sudden...

She turns around to see a now tired me and smiles and my self-gained fatigue. As soon as she had herself a good distance away from me, she manages to turn around, form a red circle around her and launch several red diamond bullets toward me.

I-I can't boost away from it fast enough! I'm too tired to do it!

I just take the full brunt of it as they focus on my chest. Some of them deviate from the spot and hit other areas, but I fall back down to the ground.

I think I hear a crack on the bottom of my back area, but the sensation of pain rushes up my spine.

I force myself to get back up off the ground, using the wooden part of the broom to support.

Damn it... She got me. Really good. While I was too busy to rush up and get up close to her, I didn't notice myself getting tired because of the temporary adrenaline rush. But now, I'm not even sure if I can beat her anymore! She outsmarted me!

If I'm going to solve this incident before Reimu though, I have to beat her!

She flies too fast and I can't fly without my broom. Flying on Marisa's broom is just like trying to driving a race car with absolutely no control of breaks! Its just too fast!

I have no attacks then! I can't get within melee range to hit her. My broom star shots maybe?

I haven't been able to shoot them since the fairies...-ack! Bullets incoming!

Blue circles bullets incoming! They spread out in a straight pattern at a fast speed and I duck down to avoid them.

This is perfect! I can counterattack here!

Ahh! I don't have anything though! God damn it!

If only I could still shoot yin-yang orbs!

Suddenly, the broom and my mind flashes a sudden white light and instantly as well, I lose control of myself for a moment as an unknown force jumps me onto the broom.

No wait! Stop body!

And it decides to just zoom off towards Shizuha's sister!

I can't close my eyes and I feel a grin forcing itself onto me without my intentions in it.

_My turn again huh?_

My mind speaks to me. Wait my mind? So my mind has a mind of its own?

The broom doesn't seem so fast all of a sudden. It feels like I have perfect control of it. Even though I really don't.

Whoever is controlling me knows what they're doing!

_You really don't recognize me?_

...

Someone who can talk in my mind...

Ms. Intuition! H-how are you still with me?

_I'll explain things later. Don't we still have an enemy? I'm not a multi-tasker you know._

But...

I hold my questions in, leaving my unsatisfied curiosity to edge to receive an answer.

I guess you have to focus on the battle though.

I just relieve control for the meanwhile, only really having eyesight view. Reimu's Intuition controlling me flies at breakneck speed at Shizuha's sister and she looks completely stunned at how I had instantly changed actions.

To try and bring me back, Shizuha decides to raise her arm into the air.

**"{Autumn Sign "Autumn Sky"}" **She calls out and energy in the form of leaves surround her before spreading out to become blue small diamond bullets that had red ones hidden in them. They crossed each other, seemingly having no space to enter through.

**"{Magic Sign "Stardust Reverie"}" **The Intuition calls out confidently using my voice to activate it. She lifts the broom over my head and swings it in a slice arc across my body, instantly filling the area in front of it with rainbow colored stars. The initial stars moved slow and she lifts her other arm up, opening her palm, spraying more of the multi-colored stars into the air.

The bullets clashed against each other, each cancelling each other out. The bigger stars started to overwhelm Shizuha's inferior diamond bullets with its size and the countless stars and through the midst of all it, the Intuition decides to jump onto the momentum created and rush forward at incredible speed.

Within seconds, I exit the giant battlefield of bullets, appearing nearly in front of Shizuha with a cocky grin on my face. I felt arrogant at that.

**SMACK! PFFT!**

A broom smack against the face and a fist into the stomach for extra time. Spin jump into the air and finish with head-crushing broom smash!

Intuition jumps back about 20 feet away from the injured girl instantly ready in case she would retaliate.

Now can you answer my question? How are you still with me?

_Geez. You're really persistent with that question. _

Well yeah. Its not that I'm complaining or anything, but help from an unexpected source begs questions.

_Hmph. Fine. I guess I have some time before Minoriko recovers. Back during Imperishable Night, before you left, I managed to attach a part of myself onto your soul._

...

What? I'm not getting it.

_My whole part is still with Reimu. I couldn't leave you alone, knowing you'd probably get yourself in troubleblesome situations. I'm just a part of Reimu's intuition. Like a piece. I split apart myself from Reimu and latched onto your soul. I manifested over the couple days and now, I'm a part of you. My whole part is still with Reimu though of course._

I'm still not getting it... But as long as Intuition 2 is around, I'm not complaining. Not telling her that though.

So... Now you can help me whenever I'm in trouble!

_Don't get lazy you lazy bum!_

Hey that hurt you know! Its not my fault I don't know Marisa's attacks.

_But you couldn't even attack with basic danmaku._

I have absolutely no comment at that.

Minoriko looks like she's recovered by now after my little silent chat with Intuition 2. I don't think should call her that all the time. That would be too awkward.

And since it looks like Intuition 2 called this new fighter Minoriko, I might as well jump in along with that.

Are you going to finish up this fight?

_No way. I already worked enough. You started this fight, so you fight it._

So whos the lazy bum now?

_What was that?_

Nothing, nothing.

_That's what I thought._

Hey how can you think anyway? You live in my soul or whatever and talk to me in my mind.

_Why don't you try answering that question?_

Fine. Screw you.

_What does that mean?_

_..._Something.

I can't help but chuckle to myself at Intuition 2's limited slang knowledge. Or if she has any.

The mental chat ends here as Intuition 2 hands me back control of my body. My sense of touch and feeling returns to me and I suddenly feel more exhausted than usual than when my control over Marisa was given to Intuition 2.

Aggh... I can feel myself just wanting to fall on my back to lay on the floor. I force myself to stay steady on my feet. Just one push or hit might knock me out for sure.

Minoriko starts to form a veil of autumn leaves and fires the same round of bullets before she had decided to use her spell card. The same blue circle shaped bullets that she had shot earlier, but this time, she also fires out the same red bullets she had hit me with the first time.

I move sluggishly to run to the left with a decreased speed, but I manage to get out of the way in time as the bullets pass me at a moderate speed.

I gotta fight back somehow! I can't keep bothering to just run. Minoriko is going to corner me sometime and I'll get shot down for sure!

Even the broom somehow felt heavier than its lighter wait.

Come on broom! Fire those bullets! I need it right about now! Please!

I feel crazy, talking to an inanimate object.

I swing the heavier broom once again, and I almost lose my grip on it from my sudden exhaustion.

But it gets the results I want! Some of the same stars from Stardust Reverie shoot out from the broom! They overpower Minoriko's bullets and creates a gap for me directly in front of me.

I feel deprived even further of my stamina from just shooting them though. Every bullet counts at this point now.

I-I. J don't know how I did it, but maybe... it just eats up energy again. Like the yin-yang orbs I shoot as Reimu.

Thats great, something else that uses up stamina.

And even then, I've swung it plenty of times! Why didn't it work when I swung it before?

_You really don't know why?_

No. If I did, I wouldn't be questioning it.

_Marisa runs off of magical energy which in turn is fueled by stamina. Marisa has an overabundace of it. Thats why she was able to shoot so many of her own bullets and create it to become bigger to overwhelm her opponents. If you remember firing yin-yang orbs, you either push the magical energy into the broom and swing it or your hands. Both shoot the the magical stars either way. Think of your hands and weapons that you hold as amplifiers for shooting danmaku. That, is the essence of it._

So the reason I wasn't able to shoot the stars from the broom when I swung it... was because I put no real magic energy into it.

_Thats right. Reimu runs off of holy power. Marisa uses magic energy. Marisa needs more effort of course since its her own power. They take different forms. Its how all danmaku are unique and original to their own person. _

This really makes Reimu look lazy, but shes powerful on her own anyway.

I don't get to question or think to myself anymore as I forget that I'm in a battle and I hear **"{Autumn Sign "Autumn Sky"}"**

Oh crap!

I'm completely unprepared as I get pelted by the same red diamond bullets as before and yellow lasers. The yellow lasers leave black singhed marks on the area it hits, generally around my apron and burns my skin as well.

The urge to retaliate rises and I lift my arm up into a outward position with my palm. I don't even bother to aim toward Minoriko or look, only thinking to shoot back at the bullets in the direction I think it was coming from.

I feel my arm and my hand tense up for a moment before slowly disappearing, no longer feeling the sense of pain, allowing me to open my eyes to watch as my hands spouted colorful stars randomly.

Most went completely in a direction that was unnecessary, but some help countered Minoriko's bullets. I stop shooting my bullets as Minoriko temporarily halts hers as well.

My vision starts getting blurry and I can barely keep myself standing. The burns on my left arm and legs aren't helping me either.

Despite Minoriko taking much less hits than me, it looks like shes starting to tire out too.

Its a stamina battle to the finish then! This is something I refuse to lose at ze!

I did not just say ze in my mind.

_You did._

Shut it. No I didn't.

_Your speech is coming along great!_

I don't think "ze," is part of the dictionary.

_Dictionary?_

Ha. Got you there.

_What'd you get me at?_

Something you wouldn't catch at all.

_Hmph. Well, don't be in denial of it so long. Ze is used occasionally by Marisa anyway._

Ok! Quiet now! If I talk to you anymore, I'll probably end up falling over in exhaustion rather than using up what I have left to beat Minoriko!

_You don't have anything left you know..._

I'll find something! I hope.

Shes not going to come to me. Shes just going to shoot her same bullets over and over!

If I take another hit, I'm bound to just fall.

Her lasers will overpower my own bullets. I still don't know if I can shoot it 100% either.

Master Spark seems like my last chance. How do I do it though?

_No! Don't!_

What! Why?

_If you use it, you'll just collapse or even die at this point!_

But its my only chance of winning right now! I have no other spell cards, I can't fire out Marisa's Star bullets right, I'm too tired to even move anymore.

_Master Spark will just eat up what's left of what you have and you probably don't even have enough to fire something of that size!_

Then what am I supposed to do! Just stand here and take everything Minoriko shoots at me? I'm no good in any later battles if I just die here!

_You're pretty much depleted of everything. Your magic energy is just too low to fuel Master Spark. If you really want to fire it, you can't use your own. _

Wait, I thought the hakkero Marisa has just fires it for me!

_Weren't you paying attention! The Master Spark uses up your own magic energy! The hakkero that Marisa uses channels it into a more condensed form, thus the beam._

God damn it all! Isn't there something else I can do?

_I'm thinking. Hang on! Give me time!_

I don't have any more time! Minoriko looks like shes about to fire again!

Intuiton 2 doesn't even answer back and I feel abandoned. Here I am, with absolutely nothing left.

My knees and legs felt like jelly and my arms dangled limply, unable to support anything anymore. My hand let go of the broom I was holding for it to clatter against the ground. Like a resignation sign.

Minoriko doesn't bother and starts her pattern of attack again. The same yellow lasers that stung and burnt me before sped toward me, only slightly slower than last time. The red diamond bullets she fired out along with it seemed like nothing in comparison.

_I got it! Pull out the hakkero!_

What?

_You aren't deaf! Pull it out!_

I drag one of my arms and place it into the apron I had to grip the smooth wooden object. The edges stabbed into my fingers as I pulled it out and looked at it confused.

Now what?

_Catch the lasers! Hurry!_

What kind of crazy idea is that! What is that supposed to mean anyway!

_Do you want to die!_

What kind of question is that! Hell no! Fine! I'll haunt you forever if you kill me though!

The first thought of catch instinctually makes me raise my dead arm with the hakkero up to one of the yellow lasers. A brght light as the laser hit the hakkero''s front and the symbol on it started glowing a dark yellow color.

_All right it worked! Now keep collecting those lasers! And don't faint on me just yet!_

Whats going to happen if I keep doing this?

Once again, she doesn't answer and I keep having the hakkero absorb the lasers.

I try to ignore the other red minor bullets hitting me, almost failing as one hit me square in the leg, nearly making me fall over.

I lose track of how many lasers the hakkero takes in, just simply putting my mind into focusing and everything into catching the yellow lasers. My eyesight becomes clear and I continue to catch the lasers that all come my way that would hit me.

3...4...is that 6?

It doesn't seem to stop at all. I keep holding up my arm and lowering it, jerking it to the left and right as well.

I don't think I can do this much longer Intuition.

_Thats all right! This should be enough to win!_

Wow, I never knew you cared so much Intuition.

_Focus! Now aim the hakkero to Minoriko._

As I completely struggle to lift up my arm, shaking as I did with my vision becoming blurry again.

I use my other arm to support my hakkero-using arm and aim it toward Minoriko through the midst of all her bullets.

_Narrow Spark!_

Whaa?

I don't get to question on why she called out a different attack instead of Master Spark as a bright yellow-whitish laser immediately shoots out small as maybe a penny at first before instantly becoming bigger and wider, making me push back slightly. Hakkero-sized spark.

Anything in its way disintegrated and the narrow spark pierced through everything to finally reach its destination. Directly onto Minoriko's stomach.

Her attack immediately stopped and the blunt laser knocks her back, forcing her to crash through one tree before sliding on across the grassy field a couple meters.

The spark stops and the glowing yellow character on the hakkero disappears as well, marking it black instead. I drop my arms immediately afterwards, overwhelmed from having to keep it up for so long and I fall flat out onto my back, allowing my legs to cave in. My arms sprawled out by themselves and I make huge gasps for air before breathing out a sigh.

Do you think we got her?

_If she's really that tired, it should be over._

What was that attack? I thought you were going to use Master Spark.

_You were getting too tired to even hold up your own arm. I panicked at first before I remember Marisa had another spark. The Narrow Spark._

I _guess_ it works if it still wins us the game. Do you know how hard it was to hold up the hakkero any longer when we fired it?

_Nope. But you won._

Don't you mean we?

_I only guided you. _

I would have been dead Intuition. Long dead before if it wasn't for you.

I swear, I can imagine and hear her giggle.

_Marisa Kirisame. I believe this was YOUR victory. I'm just an entity in you. No physical being or attachment._

If you insist... Wait a second, I'm not Marisa! Kind of.

_Ohhohoho. So you admit to being a male?_

No.

_What was that?_

No wait yes! God damn it, she tricked me!

_So you are a female?_

No!

_But you are clearly dressing like a girl then aren't you? What golden locks you have!_

And she trapped me. I lost the stupid argument. I hate you.

_Why thanks. I'll keep that in mind._

_Don't we have to keep moving? If I remember, you want to solve this incident as fast as you can before Reimu does?_

Ugh. You're right. But how'd you know that?

_I've been with you ever since the incident with Kaguya and Eirin._

Oh yeah. I forgot. If I don't get this done myself, I won't be able to fix the gap.

Theres no time to rest then.

I finally gather up my strength to get up off the grass, still exhausted from the series of battles I had consecutively with no rest.

I should go check up on Minoriko. Maybe she got hit too hard from Narrow Spark?

I walk past the broken tree ad inspect the torn and bent grass, eventually leading to the fallen body of Minoriko, the fallen Autumn spirit.

_It shouldn't have done enough to kill her. Shes just unconscious._

It looks like shes just resting now.

"Wha...?" I hear a groan as I turn around to leave.

Did she... just groan?

"What happened?" I hear her soft voice as she sits up off from the ground rubbing her head.

I see the area where the Narrow Spark hit her. Right in the rib area was a thick black mark that stained the red apron over the black cloth she was wearing.

I kneel down next to Minoriko as she continues to rub her wounded areas where I had hit with the broom.

"Are you ok?" I ask, worried that I might have done some permanent damage.

"Uh-huh... I think so." She says before she opens her eyes and takes a good luck at me. Then she backs away from me completely scared with a look of horror to put her back against a tree.

"Ayeeee~. Please! Don't hurt me! I won't ever bother you again!" Minoriko exclaims in terror, closing her eyes as if expecting me to hit her.

Arggh. How can I possibly hit you with such a scared expression like that? I can't find the evil in me to just kill you.

_Then just forgive her. No one in Gensokyo aims to really kill. Not even Reimu._

Yeah. I don't see any positives for breaking that tradition.

Minoriko creaks open on eye nervously to see me cleverly disguise my discomfort of extending my arm out to her.

_Hey... Try and be a bit more happy. Its not like shes going to attack you anymore. Just forgive her._

You said that earlier. And even if she didn't try to kill me, its hard to just shrug it off when she fought so hard. Its not like I requested her to fight with her all. I'm not going to hold a grudge, but don't expect me to try and make friends with her or anything. Different perspectives here.

_Now you're just being annoying._

Gee thanks.

Minoriko grabs hold of my arm and as she pulls on it to get up off the ground. I almost fall over from the strength she used to pull herself up. Probably because I didn't bother to lean back.

She bows before me and gives me this closed-eye smile. It makes me give a sheepish grin while scratchikng my head.

_A true Marisa. A grin with a rub on the head._

Since when were you so talkative anyway?

_I'm only taking full advantage of what I have. I couldn't talk to Reimu when I was with her but I can to you. It does get lonely if you have no one to be companions with._

Oh...

I instantly feel sorry at that. Years of no one to talk to. I think I'd go insane. It almost drops the face I'm giving to Minoriko too. Talking to Reimu might have created some problems.

Well, straight to the point now. I need some directions on the shortest way up the mountain.

"Listen. Uhhh... I need some help." I tell her, switching my grin to a natural serious frown.

She tilts her head to one side, probably wondering on what she could help with.

"Huh? With what?" Minoriko asks me, still giing me this naive confused look.

"I heard theres this new shrine at the top of Youkai Mountain and I need to head over there. Do you know the shortest way up besides flying?" I point to the tip of the shadowing mountain whose gaze appeared restless.

"Hmmm..." She thinks for a moment with her pointer finger on her chin, looking up at me with her innocent eyes. "Theres this dark creepy path that leads up to a river. After the river, its just going up up up the mountain path! But the dark path has this weird girl in it who always tries to make sure no one comes her way... Even when Nii-san and I try to talk to her, she attacks us to make us go away."

A dark path. Usually, the quickest path up is the most dangerous, gamewise. I'll take my chances. Maybe I'll get lucky and not have the girl come after me.

"Could you lead me to it?" I ask Minoriko and I catch her shiver for a split second. Is it that bad?

"Ummm. Ok..." She answers rather reluctantly, and she starts walking slowly toward my left side. I feel uncomfortable all of a sudden as she walked deeper and deeper into the forest. The trees darkened the ground area and I felt a quench in my stomach. It tightened as I followed Minoriko through the shady dirt road towards the dead trees.

We stop at a fork in the road that divides into 2. One to the left and one to the right.

"So which way?" I immediately ask her. She looks a bit nervous, taking a glance to the left then to the right.

She shakes her head before saying, "I'm not sure." I feel like facepalming myself and slamming my head against one of the dead trees.

"Sister~!" I hear a voice come from the left along with a figure whose shadow was slowly coming into view.

We both turn to face her and its... Shizuha! She ran into this dark abyss? This far?

"Nee-chan! What are you doing here?" Minoriko asks her with a somewhat shocked face. Shizuha looks at her for a second before facing me. Her relieved face from seeing her sister instantly transforms to a scared one when she sees the face of Marisa Kirisame, or me.

"Onee-chan! W-what are you doing with her!" Shizuha's face turns red and takes a couple steps back to get distance from me.

"W-wait. She's not a bad person! Let me explain!" Minoriko tries to calm her older sister down and vouch for me. Man, I swear. They should just switch positions. Shizuha should be the younger sister while Minoriko should be the older one.

And the inevitable explanation goes on starting on what happened after Shizuha ran off to my fight with Minoriko until eventually, it reaches the point where I tell her I need to get up to the new shrine on the top of the Youkai Mountain.

Yet despite all that, Shizuha still looks like she still needs some time to calm herself down. Its not my fault though. She attacked me first with her waves of bullets, so I had to retaliate. Who would just sit thre and take al lthat anyway?

"So who is this girl that chases you out of this part of the forest anyway? Is it a youkai?" I ask, curious as to whether I might fight this person. Must be a pretty scary one if it chased and scared these two sisters.

"Uhh... I'm not sure. She warned that if we stayed near her long, we would get really unlucky..." Minoriko seems to draw on her past experiences to tell me this. A youkai that causes bad luck maybe? That's obscure, but this is Gensokyo. Anything is possible. Right?

It doesn't sound that threatening... However, a possible enemy that emanates bad luck.

Sounds like a troublesome opponent already, I concluded. Inside, I think Intuition agreed as well.


	12. Incident 2: Mountain of Faith Part 3

**A.N: A faster chapter release this time around. I was somewhat enthusiastic around this one and it lead to this. I hope you people enjoy it nonetheless!**

* * *

**Gensokyo: Dark Forest: Akyris/Marisa**

So which way did I go now... Oh yes. I went to the left. Intuition 2 said.

_You decided to follow my directions. Its not as if I'm going to lead you into a trap._

That's true. Minoriko and Shizuha, before I headed to the left, decided to head back to the are where I fought them at. They told me to keep an eye out for that strange girl. A girl that causes terrible misfortune though. I think I'm starting to understand the nature of Gensokyo, kind of. Or maybe I'm wrong.

_Is that so?_

I don't know.

_I almost forgot to ask. How do you feel?_

How do I feel? Tired, but why?

_Tired... We don't seem to be in a good situation then._

I'm still exhausted from walking and fighting 2 spirits. Is something wrong?

Then it clicks into my mind. The misfortune girl, lets call her that, could come out at any time and decide to fight me in my tired state. It was a battle I might win, depending on how strong she was. I could sit and rest, but time wasn't something I had right now. Not with the unstable affliction the gap in my world had suddenly caught that would soon become a catastrophe.

_You sure catch on fast..._

Huh? Is it just me? Or...

Something isn't right. I can feel it.

_I...think, I can too. All of a sudden, it feels like I'm slowly fading away._

Fading away? How? You just showed up a few moments ago and now you're telling me you're going to die out?

_I have questions too. But no answers. I don't know what's going to happen. This forest... let's try to get out of here quickly._

If that's what you want.

And I go ahead to increase my pace of walking to nearly speed-walking. Just so I don't waste anymore precious energy.

***CRACK**

...? You hear something? From above me?

_Someone's here. Don't tell me it's her. We can't have another fight right now._

Why not? I might be tired, but if you want to end things fast, you can just control me right?

_I'm sorry. But I don't think it's possible right now. And before you ask, "Why not?", it's because if I do, I might fade away faster. I'm doing my best to stay together inside of you. I don't know what's draining me away, but I'm starting to think its from this forest. Or someone._

Someone huh? That girl probably?

_Most likely. A person of misfortune. I knew it would be troublesome._

I don't think you should talk then. Just focus on keeping yourself alive and I'll do my best to get out of here.

This terrible feeling hovers around the atmosphere , making me catch a cold chill down my spine despite wearing warm clothes. Marisa's clothes.

Another crack comes from the dead branch on the right above me and I jerk my head to quickly see who it is.

A girl I think. Whoever it is flies through the trees, breaking through the branches until they curve a bit to hover in the air some distance away from me.

Yup, its a girl. As she shows herself before me, I can see her clearly without any movement. I stop walking to get etch my opponent-to-be into my mind.

Long aquamarine hair along with red ribbons tied into a bow with white frills on its edges. A blood like red colored dress adorned her on the bottom with white frills again while the upper area had a darker shade of the red. Her upper chest area had a white ribbon and her left arm on the wrist area contained another long chain of red ribbon wrapped around it. Her leg area had knee-length boots and on the bottom of her dress, had a symbol.

It had a cane facing to the right and right next to it, the letter E in lower case. That's what it looked like.

My first question. Obvious already.

"Who are you?" I ask in a forceful tone, preparing myself for any tricks or attacks that she might pull on me.

I think my not so friendly voice scared her a bit because she flinched a bit. I think it's just me though.

"U-Ummm... I'm Hina...I-I'm sorry but I'm going to have to stop you from going any further!" Hina replies with a stutter at first, then a more courageous one. My simple reply. "Why?"

"Youkai Mountain is too dangerous for you! You have to turn back!" She answers back bravely, and I get the urge to just utterly crush it and just move on.

"I won't turn back. I need to solve some problems up there. Just let me pass through and I won't cause any trouble." Neutrally it comes out to her, but I raise my broom at her to threaten her to let me pass.

"I can't. Please leave!" Hina begs in a pleading tone now, but I refuse to listen to her.

"I already said before. I have problems to resolve up there and I won't stop until I finish." I answer back, refusing to leave.

"Then please forgive me for this." She sadly says before starting to spin in circles.

_It... It is her! She's the one making me slowly disappear somehow! It's her power as a goddess of bad luck!_

No way! A goddess? I'm supposed to beat her? And fast?

_You can run too. I highly doubt that you would be able to get away though. Combat is the worst case scenario however._

Not on ground. But maybe...

_You're not going to..._

Desperate times call for desperate measures. You non-existing in my soul is considered dying and I won't let that happen.

_Reckless. And such a foolish idea. You have no control over it._

I don't listen as I put the broom between my legs and let it boost me to about maybe 10X my walking speed. I can barely hold onto my witch hat and the broom at the same time as I rush/fly completely past Hina.

I take one quick glance at her surprised face before shifting my attention back to the front of me to avoid crashing into the trees and the dangling branches.

At this rate, we'll get out of this forest! Theres no way she can catch us now!

_Focus! Watch out!_

Too fast, too late. My mind blanks off for a split second before I realize that even though I'm flying at incredible speed, no control means I can't turn the broom. I shut my eyes close as I slam my shoulder onto the tree, making me fall off my broom onto the floor, onto my back and stopping my flight path.

Augghhh... I'm gonna feel that for years to come.

_Considering you live through all this._

Geez. You're on the border of death and you're still popping jokes at me you miserable Intuition.

_Rather be optimistic than fearful don't you think?_

Hang on, let me get back up and I'll agree.

_You can't bade your time right now. Here she comes._

Already? I quickly get back up from my pathetic failure to escape, pushing myself back up, sacrificing a few leaves. Yup the crunching of it makes it feel like I killed something.

My shoulder flinches in pain as I move it and I can't help but grasp it to foolishly hold in what I was feeling.

Hina indeed, waits for me as I get back up onto my feet, giving me her sympathy before starting to spin again.

I don't know why, but that spinning is making me irritated.

_! Shoot her quick! _

Shoot? Uhh all right!

I listen to Intuition 2's quick order and I raise my arm up to her to aim and launch my star bullets at her.

As she spins, she drops black orbs that explode, releasing green spheres that I assume are her bullets. As my bullets quickly approach her, I quickly juke the bullets, moving left and right on my feet quickly, slowly but surely draining myself.

Huh? What! Did... my bullets just past right through her? That can't be right! Is she some kind of ghost?

_I just said a moment ago she was a goddess. Try hitting her directly!_

Ok fine! But I don't want to burst energy fly up there. That'll take too long and I'll probably get hit.

...I really wish there was another way...but I'm going to have to use it again.

Magic Broomstick, please, to whatever holy entity you belong to. Please work. I can't believe I'm doing this again.

I position Marisa's broom between my legs again and it decides to magically float above the ground until I grasp onto it tight. Once I do, it zooms off at the same speed as before toward Hina. She doesn't seem to stop her spinning at all despite me flying at full speed right to her.

URGH! GOTTA! MOVE! THIS! BROOM!

I couldn't afford to miss! I roll to the left and pull towards an upward direction to try and navigate this unresponsive house-tool.

It decides to listen to me and it shifts along with me, setting a course straight for Hina. A collision course that is.

Go! Comet Missle! I decide to name this ridiculous maneuver as I brace myself to crash, deciding to close my eyes as well.

...It never comes. In fact, I phase right through her again!

What the hell! Why!

_Another reason why its best to beat her fast. Terrible luck that stacks. Or just simply run away._

I can't even hit her! And I'm still out of control.

Something hits the back of the broom, making me and it flip forward just as fast as I was soaring.

I scream without restraints as I barely grasp the broom with my life. If I let go, I would fling forward to who knows where!

Stop! Broomstick! You gotta stop! I'll die if you don't! Please!

_Your talking to a-_

I don't give a crap right now! Stop! Shouldn't you be worrying on holding yourself together!

It obeys. It halts in mid-air, but now I'm dangling against the thin end of it.

Hina finds me vulnerable and now launches the exploding orbs closer to me.

I panic and struggle to quickly get back on the tool before the orb approaches me at a somewhat slow speed.

Ok! Quick! Get us out of here! Or away at least!

Once again it listens and zooms off at its usual incredible speed once again. I find myself somewhat adjusting to it, but not comfortably. Maybe its going a bit slower than I thought. Not complaining though!

Okay. I need a strategy against Hina. I can't shoot her, nor does it look like I can hit her physically. So Shorybroomken is out and Comet Missle won't work either. I'm not sure if I can use Stardust Reverie, but if I can't shoot her, I don't think it would work anyway.

_Your getting better and better at this with every fight. I'm quite impressed at how quickly you learned with only 8 battles at your side. Let's just run away for now. You finally gained some power over the broom if its listening to you. _

Got it. I try to jerk the broom to the right toward the Youkai Mountain and although it resists at first, it gives in and turns in the direction I want it to and it flies off.

I turn around to take a glance at her to see her stop spinning. Maybe she's vulnerable now?

_No! Let's use this chance to run! We're in the air already!_

But if she's the one draining your life, then we should take her down!

_If we leave though... No stop!_

I don't bother to listen as I turn around to face Hina who still looks shocked! Go! Comet Missle!

A blue jet fire burns from the straw side of the broom and I zoom forward directly at Hina.

**BAM!**

And this time, its a direct hit! No miss or ghost-like things! A solid blow to her shoulder!

This time, she spins because I force her to and it sends her flying the opposite way I hit her.

See? I can hit her now!

Now lets do this! I feel confident all of a sudden!

Go! **"{Magic Sign"Stardust Reverie"}" **

Blast her real good!

I order the broom to get closer to Hina so that she would take every single bullet that would soon come from my hand. It stops for me conveniently in front of Hina's dazed figure and I raise one of my arms toward her who's still trying to recover from the hard blow I dealt to her. To make sure she didn't run away, I grab her as well to keep her in place.

I feel the energy rush from my chest and into my palm, unleashing an insane amount of stars. And seeing that she was completely up close, she takes every one of my bullets directly at point blank. Eventually, I hit the maximum amount of bullets that I think I can shoot and Hina blasts away from me, giving me distance from her and leaving her in a downed state in mid-air.

See? I got this.

_Again, I'm rather impressed at how you managed to damage her. But this doesn't change my thought of escaping while we still can. I can still feel myself ebbing away._

A little faith in me Intuition 2. If I can finish this fast, this'll stop.

_You're overestimating yourself now! Just run! You're not going to defeat a goddess!_

But if I don't defeat her here, how will I know I'm strong enough to beat the final boss?

_Just do it! She's starting to recover!_

"If... If you're going to be that serious. Then I'm afraid that I will too!" Hina confidently announces, extending her two arms at me.

Show me what you got, Misfortune Mistress!

**"{Scar "Broken Charm of Protection"}" **I hear, and I think I just heard Intuition 2 gasp.

Hey. Is something wrong?

_Ack!_

What? That can't be! Its only been a while snce we've been in this forest!

_Reimu's intuition... A part of it is luck based as well. That's why..._

So that's why...you're starting to disappear.

I shove my shame for not listening to the Intuition aside, and focus for what I expected to be a weak spell card.

I only saw, hundreds, thousands of bullets approaching. All of them seemed intimidating. Red diamond shaped bullets.

No way! Theres... too many of them! No way I can dodge them all!

_We gotta go down! Its better to head back down for now than in the air!_

All right! The broom agrees as well and without a hitch, dives straight for the ground and into the dead trees.

We escape from the insurmountable bullets but Hina doesn't even seem to hesitate to send another spell card at me.

**"{Fate "Old Lady Ohgane's Fire"}" **comes from behind me and I glance back to take a look at Hina leaving all her old bullets in the air.

She spins rather rapidly and red sphere bullets, similar to the one from Mokou's Everlasting Phoenix tail, unleash themselves upon me. It moves faster, however, from Mokou's and it rains down onto my position.

_Ascend! Go up!_

Okay! I pull the broom up to aim upward and its the direction we go. Some of the Fire Spheres land on the ground, exploding on contact and creating minor explosions as well.

Go go go! Come on!

I barely stay ahead of the blast radius, flying higher into the sky.

That was a clos-

**"{Bad Luck Sign "Biorhythm of the Misfortune God"}"**

Ahh! Ambushed!

Numerous of the same red diamond bullets from before spawn again once Hina spins and I don't have a chance to react.

AGGGHHH! My back gets hit several times as the bullets land harshly on me, forcing me to shut my eyes. I loosen my grip just a little bit and almost fall off of the broom, but I manage to tell it to move forward after turning around to crank one eye open.

That was close... Thanks Broom?

I looked confused at why it had just stopped. It bends downwards a little... before suddenly dropping out of the air!

What the! What happened?

_Get off the broom! Get on the ground!_

W-what? And abandon it?

_There's no other way! Unless you want to fall down along with it!_

Ugh! Fine!

I reluctantly jump off of the broom and fall quickly down to the floor. As I near it, I force my feet to exert a burst, allowing me to land softly.

The damage I take and the amount of bullets I took, forces me to kneel to the ground and gasp for air. And to add things to the matter, exhaustion was quickly catching up. Even faster than the fight I had with Shizuha and Minoriko.

Damn it Intuition... What do we do now? It's only a matter of time before she comes down here and ends this.

_...*Sigh_

I hear her sigh deeply. It makes me shut my eyes as the shame I pushed aside before hit me with double the force. Why the hell didn't I listen to it? If I did, we wouldn't be in this situation.

Hey. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that... I didn't listen to you. If I did, we could've probably escaped and not be stuck like this.

_...It's a bit late. I guess I don't have any more options._

You have a plan?

_Yeah. It was nice knowing you Akyris. Or should I say Marisa?_

I guess I can play along. Marisa Ze. Joking at the face of defeat. I can't believe this.

_One last move. _

One last... What are you planning?

H-huh? What's going on? My sense of touch and exhaustion. Its gone! I can't control myself anymore!

What are you doing!

I don't get an answer though as I, without my control, stand back up and face Hina as she descends to my position.

"All right! Here we go!" The Intuition says for me as she grabs the Hakkero from my apron.

_Take her down with one shot!_

Hina looks scared at what the Intuition is doing, especially when she aims it at her.

**"{Wound Sign "Exiled Doll"}" **Hina says in a desperate attempt to wipe the smile off my face.

**"{Magicannon "Final Spark"}" **I call out in retaliation from the Intuition.

WHAT?

The hakkero quickly charges up and I felt that after this, would be the doom for my one and only Gensokyo and combat mentor.

F-final Spark? Is this what you mean in one shot?

...No answer again.

_Akyris. Marisa. I'm afraid, that you're on your own after this. This Final Spark will drain the last of my part in your soul. Despite our short reunion, I'm glad to have had someone to talk to after seventeen years. Thank you._

No! Don't do this! We can still fly away! All I need is time to get the broom!

Too late again. It was always too late when it came to me. The hakkero charged fully and unleashed a laser even bigger than the Master Spark that Marisa had fired upon me.

Its "hmm" noise echoed into the sky as Hina and her bullets were completely engulfed in it. Its bright yellow and white beam circled by electricity shot into the air, shooting deep into the sky and maybe even into space. This was something that if taken directly, would instantly mean death.

I could only stare and feel as the laser, after holding out for 10 seconds, started shrinking. And with that, the existance of the Intuition that dwelled inside of me.

I gained control of my body again. And as soon as I did, I dropped my arm that held the hakkero into a limp and my face vaulted downwards at the realization of what just happened.

I couldn't accept it. Gone. Just within the span of 1/6 of a minute.

But now its dawned on me.

I simply dropped onto my knees and my arms supported my body up. Tears welled up inside of my eyes and flowed out like a non-stop stream. I repeatedly hit the ground to vent my frustration and sadness on it.

It's all my own fault! If I had just listened to her. None of this would have happened!

I completely ignored the bruises on my hand that were forming from punching the ground.

***CRACK**

Huh? Is... someone there? Is it her?

There she was. Hina in the flesh, gravely wounded within burn marks and burnt clothes along with it. I would rather not describe the state that she was in.

S-she couldn't have survived that! No way!

I quickly stood up, wiped the tears and prepared myself for combat in case she would try to fire again. Instead, she fell onto the ground unconscious.

...I forgot. Shes a goddess. She can't die.

No matter how much I wanted to strangle and kill Hina. I couldn't. Then I remembered.

Despite how harsh someone would be, every opponent that the heroines faced would survive. Whether from their kindness, I didn't know. It was somewhat of a tradition.

But that also led me back to thinking of the Intuition along with the negative thoughts. More tears flowed down my face as I decided to just ignore Hina for now and look for the broom to just fly to the mountain.

Ahh...There it is. I pick it up between a bush and a dead tree to place it between my legs. The broom, as if feeling my sorrow, decided to show no objections on flying out of control this time and just flew slowly into the air, allowing me to brood over on what had happened during the course of the dark forest.

* * *

**Real World: The Woods: Renko and Maribel**

"I think we did it Maribel!" Renko shouts out excitedly about being able to construct a new invention.

"It certainly took a while. But I think we finally managed to stabilize it for now." Maribel tiredly agrees, laying down against the tree.

"I don't know how long though so hopefully, Akyris will be able to resolve whatever incident he's in and close up this unstable part." Renko adds in, exhausted from the invention she had finished.

"I'm worried for him. Something doesn't seem right Renko." Renko's partner says worried, looking into the gap that had previously been out of control.

"You too? I'm getting that feeling also. It isn't a minor one either. Something bad is going to happen." She replies, starting at Maribel for a moment before following her gaze.

I hope he prevails whatever is happening in Gensokyo... They both think to themselves.

* * *

**Gensokyo: Kappa's Domain: Akyris/Marisa**

... The river. Just like Minoriko said. Its a straight river that goes up to the Youkai Mountain.

This broom. It hasn't been out of control ever since my... fight with Hina if I can consider it that. It's flying at a steady slow pace as I wanted to. I guess its almost like Intuition 2's last gift.

No... that's thinking she's dead and gone forever. Maybe she's still alive out there somewhere.

But that's wishful thinking. And denial that shes gone. It's too hard for me to accept.

How am I going to finish this incident now? 4 more stages left. And the EX stage to go along with that.

Broom, down there. The river. Let's take a drink from it before we go. Or, let me drink from it. Unless you have a mouth.

...

It obeys me, but my own attempt to cheer myself up failed.

The broom stops right above the ground at feet's length and I drop down to kneel at the river bank to cup my hands together. My reflection over the river only showed me how miserable I was right now.

After taking a couple sips, I slowly try to calm myself down and think through this. What would the Intuition do, or say.

That's obvious now. It's still hard to deal with. I'll have to put this aside for now. As difficult as it is, I have to finish this incident.

Come on Broom, let's get this incident over with.

As I mount up and fly up, I notice a few people looking at me from the river, well just their heads. Some of them have a strange green hat on while some of them don't.

I guess these are my enemies for this stage. Strange how it was only Hina last time, but now, it's these strange people hiding under the water.

Some of them exit the water and show themselves a little bit more. I stare at them for a bit before I notice blue sphere bullets coming right for me!

It's an attack! Intuition! Should we-.

Oh yeah... Shes gone. I hesitate for a moment before snapping out of my sorrow to focus on another battle that was undoubtedly to come. I'll dodge them all for now and fire back at them. Have to stay focused if I'm gonna get through this.

This is. My first Gensokyo fight without any help. I have to get through all this and live. I won't let the Intuition's sacrifice be in vain by just dying.

I aim down backwards, trying to find some faces in the water to shoot at and fire a couple of my own rainbow stars towards them.

I maneuver to the left to avoid the bigger blue spheres by leaning my body to the left and dive down a bit and try to sharply turn right, almost losing my as I hung upside down to fire star bullets back at the people underwater.

Shift back up! Back up!

I do a clear heading into higher air and pull left again to dodge this time, a small thin laser. Its not as big as Narrow Spark, but it looks like it could be a huge threat.

Dodging, and firing back at these river people was quickly becoming tiring on me and it seemed that these barrages were only endless.

This isn't working. I need to do something else. I don't think my shots are hitting them. Maybe just forcing them underwater to duck and cover but thats it.

All I have is the open air to dodge in. I guess I'll get out of their range then! Full speed ahead Broom!

Full speed it goes, though it still feels unstable for me to be holding on, barely being able to control where I'm going. I take peeks down at the river to see bullets coming for me, but I completely get out of the way with this unbelievable speed right now. None of them can hit me.

At this rate, I'll be able to get out of here as soon as possible. We're almost at the very base of the mountain. And theres the path going directly up it!

These people, why are they even shooting at me anyway? Its not like I attacked first!

I guess I'm trespassing then?

Huh? Someones up ahead! It looks like another one of those people again.

Hang on Broom. Stop for a sec, it doesn't look like this one is hostile. Yet.

I stop in front of one of those same water people from the river and shes probably the most normal person I've seen so far.

Blue most definitely fit her. Along with green. Blue boots, blue dress with a ton of pockets for whatever reason I don't know, green hat, and a, oh my god. A backpack. I'm actually surprised right now. Now shoo, I got an incident to solve.

Not talking? I guess I'm first then.

"Who are you and why are you guys attacking me? I Just want to get to the top of the mountain." I ask in a nicer tone since she decided not to attack me along with the others.

"W-what? The top? But why?" She asks curiously in a shy tone. So a shy girl?

"There's something going on up there and I need to figure out what. Its affecting someone who overseers the border right now. Can you please let me go?" I answer, though I'm a bit bothered that she didn't answer on why her fellow people attacked me.

"But! It's too dangerous up there for you! You should go back while you can! The Tengu's there won't show you mercy if you go up higher right now!" Nitori begs in a begging tone, very similar to Hina's.

"I'm too far now to stop. I have to get up there. Please, let me go up there. I won't stop no matter what." I answer back with a bit of bravado. Honestly, I was still scared of whatever was up there. Along with these "Tengus," that Nitori mentioned.

She looks speechless for a second, until I hear voices below us. One of the ones I hear were, "There she is," along with "Nitori! Get her! Fire!"

The girl I assume is Nitori looks stunned at her comrade's actions and I take the opportunity to try and rush past her.

Come on! We can get away!

And we stop. It failed. She is actually quick to reach to pull out some kind of machine which holds me in place in the air.

Crap! So much for a breakthrough. I have no choice then. I've had enough of this. Peace negotiations are over. Sorry Nitori, its nothing personal.

I turn around and aim my arm towards the machine thats holding me place to spray a few star bullets at it.

**BOOM!**

Its a minor explosion from it, but it sets me free from her machine's grasp.

As if expected, she pulls out another one, though this one is shaped and looks like its configured like one of those remote toy car controllers. She hits a button on it and a rainbow-ish hexagon layered barrier forms over a good amount of area, trapping me, Nitori, and the river people down below us who looks like they are about to prepare to shoot me out of the sky.

I don't want to initiate combat. If I shoot Nitori down and hurt her too much, I might break the controller. I'll have to break that barrier down then. I think I have an idea on how to do it.

Her backpack top opens up to reveal a nozzle that springs from inside. This doesn't look good already.

But I assume its high tech weaponry, so she'll shoot some lasers soon.

Before I even get to take a shot at her though, she disappears! Where did she go?

And before I even get a third thought, bullets suddenly fly out in front of me.

The first reaction I get is to dodge all these incoming bullets and somehow find where she is.

Is she over there? I move into a gap created by two seperate line of blue diamond bullets that overlap each other, though it's much harder in the air than on the ground. As I search vainfully for her while attempting to dodge all her bullets, it starts to become more and more of a burden on me.

Maybe... over there! This time, I'm going to shoot at the area where the bullets come from next!

I hear bullet noises from behind me and I instantly boost forward and do a complete U-turn and decide to fire a vague spread of the usual stars as well as attempting to weave in and out of the bullets. Some of them hit me, but its not as painful as I thought it would be. I completely ignore it as I continue to spray and pray.

**Ksssssss!** The sound of something malfunctioning?

If I look closely enough, theres this silver-ish color in the air. Maybe that's her? It's moving around, it has to be Nitori!

Full speed ahead broom! Comet Missle! I'm getting that urge. The urge to, "Do the Barrel Roll!" I spin as well, enthusiasm filled as I high speed rush toward the moving stealthed Nitori that doesn't seem to notice that I see her.

**BAM!** A solid hit on her and with that, Nitori finally goes into plain view.

"Oh no... My Optic Camouflage." She sounds disappointed that I caught her and destroyed her little stealthie machine. You should! You gave me a lot of trouble to try and find you! I got lucky I even hit you!

She flies further away from me, but I decide to be relentless in my attack and perform another Comet Missle on her, along with the Barrel Roll tactic in the case she might fire at me.

**"{Flood "Diluvial Mere"}" **She calls out another spell card. I somewhat, expected it.

As fast as she calls it, water indeed comes! Almost like a flash flood! The bullets don't do squat against me since I literally ram into them, causing no effect on me.

My Comet Missle is pushed back from the wave that suddenly came out and all my speed and momentum is for naught as the water magically disappears as well.

So no close quarter attacks then. Let's try this this then!

Go! **"{Magic Sign "Stardust Reverie"}"** My own spell card activates and I feel the familiar starsurge sensation flow into the palm of my hand again.

Rapid fire star shooting! Pew Pew Pew Pew Pew!

Nitori's bullets come once again and it matches toe to toe with my own. I fly forward at slow speed at first, somewhat multi-tasking on telling the broom what to do while firing at the same time. As I eventually outnumbered Nitori's, I reached the peak number and I attempt to do another Comet Missle.

The air was filled with stars and blue spheres, giving me the perfect blend in. Ahh, there she is! Full speed ahead!

Her shock is really giving me pleasure. She raises her hand to me in quick retaliation, but I end up giving her another hard blow to the shoulder, making her spin.

If I do it fast enough now... Broom Smash! I pull the broom from under me, taking the wooden part as the grip and forcing down the straw part to smash and force Nitori downwards. My momentum is lost and I panic once a mechanical hand from her backpack appears and grabs a hold of my broom, leaving me completely vulnerable. If I let go, I would fall who knows how many feet.

She's still recovering from the solid crash I gave her. If I can just get this stupid metal hand off my broom! I let one of my arms go off the broom and fire off star bullets that chip away at the metal section and it lets go as if in pain. I quickly position the broom beneath me before I can fall too much and hold my position in the air.

That was a close one! I was scared out of my wits! But now it looks like Nitori is pretty mad that I destroyed her mechanic arm since she has this open mouth face by the looks at it. And now a small scowl that I find hilarious even though I'm supposed to be fighting.

My bullets are starting to become ineffective though. This isn't good. There haven't been any lasers yet so I can't fire off one of my own.

Wait a moment. Maybe I can just shoot it on my own without having Nitori shoot lasers at me!

I don't think I'll be able to shoot off a Master Spark or a Final Spark. I already ache on various parts of my body from continuous fighting and I'm too tired again to shoot one.

Maybe a narrow spark will do then! Just like agaisnt Minoriko! Except, its by my own power! And the hakkero's sort of. I doubt it'll be able to take out that barrier without any more power though.

Let's try talking one more time before I do anything.

"Look Nitori. I just need to get up there. I don't want to fight. Just let down that barrier and I'll leave you all alone." I plead once again to her to let me through. Obviously, it fails and more tools come out of her backpack. Just how many can that thing hold?

**"{Water Sign "Kappa's Great Illusionary Waterfall"}"** I hear and the first thought that runs through my mind. Illusionary Waterfall? More water? At least I don't have to worry about a shower too much.

A huge layer of gigantic blue spheres formed in front of Nitori which I automatically assume that it would be some sort of barrier. I doubt any of my regular bullets will get through that. Narrow Spark, what a coincidental and convenient time to be forced to use it.

The aqua bubbles in front of Nitori start gushing out water at an extremely fast pace, following true to the Waterfall title indeed.

The hakkero takes energy to create a more dense version and releases it in the form of the laser. So all I have to do pour some of own into it and it'll become a spark?

Dang. I have a bad habit of thinking too much in combat. I need to move before these... I can't tell if their water or not, but I'll avoid them anyway.

I pull out the hakkero, allowing the same sensation of shooting my regular Star bullets come forth into my palm to allow it to be taken in by the hakkero. The symbol on it flashes slowly as if it again like the broom, had a mind of its own. Me, I just thought it was a sign that it accepted what I gave it.

I gotta get a little closer to get a clear shot. Or I'll miss and just end up wasting whatever I have left.

I weave through the incredibly small gaps that the waterfall bullets gave, though it seems to do me no harm when I accidentally graze a couple of them.

Some of them though, actually sting me, making me falter on trying to hold steady on the broom while aiming at Nitori directly.

I think this should be close enough! Fire, Narrow Spark!

The hakkero symbol suddenly stayed a solid yellow whiteish color before firing a small thin laser about 8X smaller than the Final Spark that the Intuition had shot for me with the last of her life.

Either way though, it blows right through the bubble in front of Nitori and she flies up higher just in time to dodge my Narrow Spark.

Not yet! Another one! Fire!

I perform the same method and another Narrow Spark fires out again and Nitori this time, is too slow to react, hitting her on the shoulder-arm area.

Some of the people from below who I COMPLETELY forgot about shout from below. It catches my attention and before I know it, a gun? Wait, a turret appears from the ground!

And it shoots green lasers at me! This is it! I can use these to power for a Master Spark and get out of here!

My attention goes off Nitori and I fly downwards to catch the lasers that the turrets were shooting at me.

I miss a couple of them, making me resist the urge to shout in pain as it grazes through my hand, my arm, my shoulder, and my leg.

I take a quick glance back at where I thought was Nitori to see that she disappeared. She's out for the battle I guess. Less complications to deal with now.

The hakkero, with every laser that goes into it, makes it flash faster and faster. Slow at first so that it blinked every 4 or 5 seconds, before it eventually became 2 then 1 second.

This should be enough! Now lets hope this works!

**"{Love Sign "Master Spark"}" **I say an exact imitation of what the Marisa from Imperishable Night had said, releasing a circle right in front of the hakkero and firing the same exact laser that she had fired at me, toward the barrier that blocked passage to the Youkai Mountain.

It pounds against it harshly, but I don't notice that its only getting absorbed. It sure didn't look like it.

Reflect! I hear that from below and I immediately stop the Master Spark and jerk my head downwards.

What the hell? This barrier can reflect?

Reflect it did. Because here comes my own Master Spark!

Shit! I gotta get out of the way! I immediately try to fly higher only for the straw end of the broom to get extinguished for good and with that, my flight source.

I can make it! Come on!

But the end of the Master Spark zapped my arm and my leg. It suddenly felt numb and I could lost my sense of touch within them. My broom fell down along me, with only the stick end to compensate for my failure.

Did I scream in pain? Yes. As loud as I could.

My fatal injury to my left arm and leg. I couldn't even move anymore as whatever energy I had zapped away along with the reflected Master Spark. It was such a brutal shot.

I struggle to turn around to no use, but I continue to defy my inevitable fate.

God damn it! I was doing so good too! I let my guard down that Master Spark was going to be a finishing win!

Halfway through the air, I just stop fighting against my fate of crashing down to the ground.

Wait! The River! If I can land there!

I force the last of whatever I have left into my feet to push me a little more to the left. This should do it!

This is gonna hurt! Not in comparison to that damn reflected Master Spark though!

**SPLASH!**

I land with my back first into the water and I finally figure out. This river is much deeper than it looks! I didn't even bother to hold my breath.

I can't move either! I'm just gonna sink then!

I jerk my arms in a downward position in a futile attempt to push me back up to the surface. My numb arm rejects my order of moving though and ends up limp.

I sink further and further down deeper with rapid thoughts of still trying to pull myself out of this situation despite that it was hopeless.

In the end, I failed. I didn't accept it and tried to hopelessly get back up to the surface.

No! It can't end like this!

Thats the last thought I had before I lost all consciousness and my short breath of air, not knowing whether death was here for me.

Damn all the luck in the world!

* * *

**A.N: Dun dun dun! Its over! The end! Last chapter? I guess. I'll let you guys have at it. **


	13. Akyris' Recovery

**The Gap Between Gensokyo and The Real World:**

**Maribel/Renko**

"Are you okay Maribel? How do you feel?" Renko asked, nervous on Maribel's condition. They both sat near a futon that contained their patient.

"I think I'm okay. I didn't think, it would have come to this Renko." She replied in a exhausted tone that desperately called for water. Her gaze went to Renko for a moment to see Renko's concerned face.

"Three times right? That's one down then. At least we got him out in time. If you sensed him any later, I thought it would've been over for sure." Renko comments in a solemn tone, staying focused on the unconscious person. "How long do you think until he wakes up?" She asks as well, still concerned about Akyris.

"Three times. I'm not sure Renko. His left arm and leg was burnt badly, its a wonder how his flesh is still in place. Overexhaustion has caught him to him as well. There's no telling when he'll wake up." Maribel answers regretfully. Severe burns along with exhaustion.

"It's getting dark Maribel. Let's get some sleep and hope he wakes up soon. He's our only hope right now to fix this foolish mistake we made. I wish it didn't have to come to this." Renko suggested, standing up from their kneeled position and pulling Maribel off of the ground.

The sound of footsteps went farther and farther from the body as the japanese slide door moved aside to open, and then eventually close, leaving Akyris alone.

**Akyris**

...I just cheated death. I can't believe it. I panicked before my eyes and I don't remember a thing from when I drowned in that river to now.

I did hear their conversation though. Looks like Maribel saved me somehow. Was it recent? Who knows? Maribel actually.

Luck didn't abandon me at all. Intuition is luck right? Could it be that...

I couldn't help but feel that slight slimmer of hope that Intuition was alive. It was slim, but it was there. Right?

All the wounds I've taken are bandaged up from my back, my leg, and my arm. My arm and leg felt the worst. Undoubtedly, because of that reflected Master Spark. They were no longer numb, but this meant it left this irritating periodic burn that would pain me every once in a while. Its like Defeat's mark. It just means that you've finally lost a battle.

I lost. That's right. That river stage 3 right? Where I fought Nitori. I gained the upper hand until I tried breaking down that barrier to go higher up the mountain. After those river people shot those lasers at me, I thought nothing could have gone wrong once I used it to try and break down their barrier.

And I lost my mentor. The Intuition. It was still all my fault for being so stupid for refusing to follow her directions. Following this defeat, makes it seem like it was all a waste of effort. For me to return back to my world when I lost a friend who decided to wipe out Hina to let me go on only for me to be beaten. It was all for naught.

It was like spitting on Intuition's grave if she had one. Disrespecting it.

It even hurt when I tried to frown, so instead, I kept a neutral face on.

Questions flowed through my mind such as "How did I survive in such a bad situation," and ,"Was the Intuition I had still alive?" Some I knew would be answered by Maribel and Renko. Some wouldn't.

It wouldn't stop putting me on edge until I got the answers I wanted. But I would always be put on edge now since it was still a mystery for me if Intuition was still alive. Stroke of lucks involves her, so...

I wished desperately for an easy way out. Like one of those stories that had happily ever afters. This wasn't the case now. This was reality. And the dangers of having an adventure. Things would be gained and lost. Right now for me, my motivation to try and prevent a catastrophe died away when I heard I survived.

I was weak. What good could I do now? A second chance? What good would that give me when I already proved myself to be a failure by failing to resolve an incident that my friend died in?

The thoughts just ate away at me, keeping me unsettled until I think my mind had enough and just decided to shut down and let me sleep. It would only eat me away more tomorrow. After all, there was plenty of time to kill parts of myself over it.

* * *

_The next day..._

I awake to the sounds of footsteps moving around Maribel and Renko's house, along with the smell of tea. I swear, tea seems to be a common thing in anything that relates to Gensokyo.

I try to get up, only for my body to protest to just lay down and rest by shoving signals of pain throughout itself. Guess I'm not getting back up on my feet today then.

Someones coming.

I shut my eyes close and the Japanese slide door leading to the room I was in open and clunks agaisnt something. Someone approaches me and sets down something next to me as I hear a heavier pound of someone kneeling.

The strong whiff if tea makes me move my nose a little bit and I hope no one catches that. I didn't wanted to get busted just yet.

"Akyris are you awake?" Its Renko's voice. She sounds more worried than upset that I screwed up though.

If she asks or says anything...

"I know you're awake. Stop pretending." She says in a more upset tone now that I'm pretending to stay asleep.

I obey her and just force my eyes open and turn my head left to see her with her usual clothes.

"Good morning I guess... Tea again?" I ask her, turning my head to the tea tray and tea pot.

"I can't really cook. Only Maribel can and she's not up yet. I thought it would be better if she slept longer since she brought you back." Renko answers along with telling me why shes the only one up.

"Brought me back? What are you talking about?" I question her again, thinking on how I somehow escaped Death's grasp on me.

"You were supposedly supposed to die right? Before you truly pass on to the Netherworld, your spirit and body split away from the person you were borrowing and we managed to get them before you entered somewhere where we couldn't reach." She answers, making almost no sense to me whatsoever.

Renko sees my confused face before sighing and thinking of another way to describe it to me.

"Think of it like this. On a border of life and death, you undoubtedly left the life border and went inbetween the 2 borders. However, we managed to get you back to us before you entered the death border." Another version she uses. I understand it better this time. Basically, I escaped death with the help of two people. Not alive, but not exactly really dead either.

I thought I would be a bit more surprised. I guess with how tired I am right now, I just don't want to overexert myself.

"I almost forgot to do something." Renko says, setting down her tea cup onto the tray.

"Oh? And whats that?" I almost predict another slap to the face.

...?

"You idiot! Do you know how much we were scared when you were so close to dying?" She nearly shouts suddenly and wraps her arm against me.

Uhhh. Whoa. I didn't expect this at all.

It isn't bad at all though. It makes me almost forget of the fact that I screwed up to save the Intuition and to resolve the incident. She's got this bright aura right now.

I'm too stunned to do anything back though. Joke time.

"Renko... you're heavy... Need air." I pretend to gasp out in pain.

**SLAP!**

Now she immediately lets go then gives me a hard face slap from that awkward position. Amazing feat.

"I. Am. Not. Heavy. This is what I get for caring for you? Hmph!" Renko denies before giving me a glare, the opposite side of her face with the hands under the armpits pose.

Okay okay, serious mode time then.

"So how long have I been out?" I go back into a more stern look and Renko detects it.

"A whole day actually. I was expecting you to be unconscious longer since Maribel said you had severe burns and exhaustion." She goes ahead and picks up her tea cup again and tells me before taking a long sip out of it.

Now thats kind of getting irritating.

A whole day. They must mean yesterday. I was awake that time, so that means I woke up a while after they brought me back.

The negative thoughts decided to return to me again and fill my head with thoughts of failing to resolve the incident and therefore, failing to save the world. Along with failing to keep the Intuition alive.

No... not now. I can't let her see it. Please.

It didn't decide to show any mercy though and it hit me full force that I still was a complete failure. Two catastrophes that could've been averted had I done things right.

I couldn't hold it in any longer and I broke down as silent as I could without letting Renko see what was going on. I turned the other way away from her to face the doorway.

She found out anyway once she heard one of my sniffles.

"Hey. Is something wrong, Akyris?" Renko immediately sets her cup down to stand up and go around me to take block my path and look at me clearly.

"Huh? Why are you crying!" She nearly shouts at me though completely worried for me.

I couldn't help it anymore. I just needed to spread it somewhere. Anywhere. To just let it all out.

"I-I f-failed Renko... I died as Marisa during the incident. O-one of m-my friends did t-too." I kept stumbling with my voice between my sniffs and trying to talk to Renko clearly.

"Your friend? You made a friend in Gensokyo? Who was it?" She asks me to satisfy her curiosity, maybe to try and comfort me too.

She didn't seem to care about me failing, but she did about my friend.

"R-Reimu's Intuition." I gasped out, letting her take some time to sink in.

"Reimu's Intuition? How?" Renko is somewhat relentless in her questions, but I don't mind answering them. If just to ease my own pain.

I tell her everything about the Intuition. From when she first appeared when I fought Wriggle Nightbug during the Imperishable Night Incident. All my various moments with her when she had appeared to either give me advice, fight for me, or just simply talk to me.

She learned about how she stayed with me when I eventually returned from the incident, a part of the Intuition split itself to attach onto my soul which in turned, became its own entity, dwelling among my soul and mind. The hardest part for me to say was obviously when I had refused to listen to her better judgment, forcing her to sacrifice herself to fire a Final Spark and defeat the goddess of misfortune, Hina.

She listened to it all. Nodding at times and eventually letting me break down onto her skirt, not caring that my tears were staining it. She didn't bother to care as it stained and she hugged me. I was shocked at first, but I didn't regret telling her one bit or that shes hugging me. I felt somewhat less pathetic with her.

"I. I don't know how it is to lose a friend like that. Maribel's always been with me through thin and thick. But, I won't ever turn a blind eye to a friend." Renko has some difficulty saying that to me, and I take it all in stride.

Overall so far, this isn't helping me too much.

I still felt like a piece of crap. I was only half listening to Renko at a certain point.

The last thing on my mind. I pull away from Renko and solemnly and shamefully looked down at my bed covers.

"And I failed. I didn't resolve the incident. I let my guard down and I nearly died. If it wasn't for you and Maribel, I wouldn't even be here. I'm so worthless. I let my own friends down and couldn't finish what me and the Intuition started. Even at her own death." No tears came out this time. I ran out of it.

"You aren't worthless. We saved you because you're our friend. I won't leave anyone behind like that to die. I don't know how it feels to be close to dying, but I can still try and help you. You're still alive. That's what matters right now." She continues to argue against my self-inflicted pain. In a way, it was somewhat masochistic. I was only hurting myself, but I didn't like it. Yet, I was doing it anyway.

It was hard to say whether Renko was doing a good job at trying to help me. It didn't seem to be working though. Either way, I stopped flooding rivers out of my eyes. The initial pain was now gone, but now the guilt settled in to take its place.

"I still have questions though..." Curiosity hit me again, coupled with my expected consequence for failing to resolve Mountain of Faith.

Time to see how much damage I did for losing. I've never felt so tense or pressured before right now.

"I guess you would after being alseep for a whole day. Go ahead, I'll answer what I can."

"This is your house right? Isn't the gap still unstable since I didn't solve the incident?" I nervously ask, unable to figure out how we were at the gap between my world and Gensokyo's.

"Oh. That. We were afraid that the gap were too unstable, you wouldn't be able to come back. So we created an invention to temporarily keep the gap stabilized until you fix it. We don't know how long it'll hold together though." She says, and honestly, it stung really hard and I also felt useless now.

At the same time, it made me angry. If they created an invention to hold the gap together, then couldn't they have just created something to permanently fix it?

My hands curled into fists and grappled onto the bed covers as I thought deeper into this.

Some of my held in anger shifted towards them, but not enough to snap at Renko. Just barely.

I felt like this was the point where I started drifting away from Renko and Maribel. Talking to them now seemed unnecessary.

If I weren't involved in all this, then maybe this wouldn't have happened. I'd live a normal life, not have to worry about freaking saving the world. I wouldn't have to feel so bad about failing to try and prevent a catastrophe. Or losing my friend.

I just wanted to leave this place now. I wanted to go back to my house and sleep and do all my own stuff again. To turn back time and never have gotten sucked through my computer screen.

I found this all ironic too. I was dealing myself pain, then trying to shift it to others. I kept making myself fall into sorrow and finally I just couldn't take it anymore. So I had to blame it on someone else. Now I'm a sadist?

"Maybe you should sleep again. We did everything we can to help you recover and Maribel can help make it go faster later. But right now, you should rest." Renko suggests again, gripping my shoulder lightly and pushing it in a downward position to lay my head down.

That sounds really good right now. I don't want to think anymore about this. I want to stay asleep forever. Then I could just stay away from all this.

Yeah...that sounds good.

I closed my eyes, allowing myself to reach a point of no thought to fulfill my basic body need of sleep. All the others like food and water were simply ignored for now.

* * *

_4 days later_

**Real World: Akyris' House**

**Akyris**

I'm finally back to normal. Physically only. Maribel did something with me that made me heal faster. Kind of like Yukari, though to a much slower extent.

Similar powers? It definitely looks like it right now.

They suggested that I go about my daily business, mentioning that club meeting would be canceled due to recent events. Lokon ended up being the only one at the clubroom and he blamed it on me for not telling him.

I couldn't resist but laugh at his little misfortune.

I managed to get up from the bed and struggle to walk a bit because I didn't have a chance to for a while. Also, the burns I still had lingered on me, deciding randomly to send a painful sesnsation on my shoulder and back every once in a while. That was 3 days ago.

On the same day, once I got the OK to move around again after surprising both Renko and Maribel, I wanted to leave for some time alone. They let me go, and I went right ahead to head back home. I haven't heard from them recently, but I don't care right now.

"Akyris~! Dinner time!" Mom calls out to me upstairs and I drag myself out of my chair and downstairs to the kitchen.

Dad is home today, looking at me with those hawk eyes. He blinks every once in a while and he doesn't stop staring at me, even as he's chewing food. It creeps me out and sends down a nervous shiver down my spine.

I barely eat in the end. What I eat wasn't even half of what I would normally chomp down when I was hungry. My appetite was lost after a few bites and I just excuse myself from the table, leaving my bowl in the sink for it to be washed later.

It was a nearly silent dinner with occasional talking between Mom and Dad. I remained completely quiet without speaking a word to either of them.

I go back up to my room to escape reality by deciding to game on my PC again. It's a great way to keep my mind off of these past events right now.

Now what to play? Touhou Fortress again?

I'm not in the mood to try and do too much though. Something else then.

Emulator then. It always has something good. Old games are always classics.

I scroll down the emulator list of SNES games and find Megaman X. I've always loved the old Megaman series. Especially 2. That one was really good.

The intro screen goes ahead to start up and I temporarily forget what happened previously again. My concentration goes onto my monitor as I go right ahead to the intro screen.

As my mind focuses solely on the game, I don't notice the time pass by along with the knock on my door. That's what you get for wearing a headset to listen to your stuff.

Ugh. I don't want to stop playing and answer my door right now.

"Akyris. You have 2 people that need you. They say it's an emergency." My Dad's gruff voice told me as I paused my game. I hear him head back down the stairs.

I sigh to myself, get off of my chair, and head to the door to unlock it and open it.

It's them. Renko and Maribel again. They look exhausted, like they just ran 5 miles without even stopping. Their breaths are heavy and finally, Renko stops her breath to talk to me. I can almost see what's coming now.

My eyebrows rise up to question what they're going to tell me. It's already obvious if they rushed here in a hurry.

"Akyris! The gap! It's... It's becoming unstable again!" Maribel panics with a gasp in between to catch another breath into her lungs.

Yup. I definitely saw this coming.

"Again? Can't you do something about it?" I question them in a dull tone.

"We tried to stabilize it already. It's not working! You're going to have to-" Renko answers on what she tried to do, but when I hear that it wasn't working, I snap.

"Then make something new! You don't need my help!" I shout at them, unable to control myself and I'm sure my Dad and Mom from downstairs hear it.

They both looked shocked that I was denying them help. I didn't care at all.

"Look. I can't help you. Not anymore." I was seething with anger and it barely came out clear. They seemed to have heard and understood it anyway.

"But we need your help! Please!" Maribel begs, holding her hands together as if in a prayer. Not going to help.

"Oh yeah sure! Can't you just fix the damn thing? I never asked to be involved in this stupid mess! I screwed up! Isn't that enough reason!" Anger shouts back for me in my reply, clenching my fists together.

**SLAP**

...

That stung really bad. I'm sure that Renko just left a red mark on my face.

"If we could have fixed it, we would've done it already. But if you're not going to help, then fine! I regret trying to help you at all now!" Renko stomps down downstairs in anger.

I could only stand there as Maribel decided to follow Renko, but not before giving me a look of disappointment.

That didn't last very long at all.

Huh. Oh well. The faster it ends, the better. I don't want to get involved anymore. I've had enough of this.

I slam the door close and lock it, losing my gaming mood.

Regret trying to help me? All I did was fail.

But I'm so confused now. They want me to help them a second time even though I told Renko what happened. She probably told Maribel what had happened to me during the time I was in Mountain of Faith.

I was determined to not help anymore so I wouldn't make any more of those mistakes and not involve myself in this crap again.

My anger towards the two females slowly dissipated. Definitely a mood tornado right now. First, I was feeling OK from gaming. Then once Renko and Maribel showed up and asked for help again, I got angry. And now, I feel a bit... remorseful for not helping now.

For the next few hours, I simply laid on my bed, unable to erase the thoughts of why they had tried. What's going on really?

Starting from evening, night came and so did midnight. I found myself unable to sleep, even as I forced my eyes shut to attempt to sleep.

I repeatedly sigh to myself, failing to shake the thoughts out of my head. It never left me alone, like a predator who would not lose their grip on a prey.

Another look at my clock. 12:53 in the morning. I'm not going to get any sleep today, that's for sure.

I roll over my blanket, twist myself around to end up in a seating position, then stand up, deciding to head out.

Heading down the stairs while being sneaky. I hate this part. No matter how slow and how quiet I move, I can never escape without making a noise. Footsteps, creaks. You name it. Even trips.

Dad's a heavy sleeper. You'd have to practically shake him or push him off the bed to get him up. I don't think he would notice a small noise. Mom on the other hand... One thump and it's right out of bed for her.

There's that creak stair step.

Moving past it is somewhat of a pain. I have to kind of guess where to place my foot. Waiting to let my eyes adjust seemed too long, so I just lay my foot onto the next one randomly, luckily skipping that single one while holding onto the rail to keep my balance.

Ok. Now out the door.

The lock clicks open and I twist the knob the exit the door, making sure to lock again once I head to the outside streets.

The night sky had no stars this time. Just a cool breeze, only raising my anxiety.

It left a gaping hole in my stomach. That bad pit that just screamed ,"Something's wrong! Something's wrong!"

I wasn't really thinking of anywhere to go in particular. No doubt all the shops would be closed. My feet decided to move on its own anyway to a random direction while my mind blanked out periodically, switching between thinking of the gap and the reasons why I was feeling regretful.

This seems to be happening to me a lot now. Moving on my own and all.

I stop. Outside the forest. Of course it would lead me here. This is where it is right?

Wait. If Renko and Maribel's home is inside the gap and it's messed up right now. Where are they sleeping then?

I rush into the forest blindly, making the grass bend with every footstep, with my distraught mind.

There's the clearing! I shove the bush aside to see Renko and Maribel

Both sleeping in sleeping bags next to the gap. They weren't lying when they said it was distorted again.

Lightning crackled inside of it, along with moving in a strange pattern.

Looking at it now, I think this looks even worse than when I saw it before Mountain of Faith. My sense of duty wanted try and help fix it, but my stronger mindset, the "**** all this. No more." took priority.

As I kept staring at it, something grabs the sides of my stomach and I get pulled deeper into the thicket! My eyes open in shock and I yelp in surprise into the hand that covers my mouth.

"MMPHM!" I scream into this mysterious person's mouth again to try to call for help, only to find it completely futile. Renko and Maribel don't hear me as I'm dragged back quite some distance away from them. I lose sight of them and I land back on my back near the entrance of the forest.

As I pull myself together from this sudden ambush, I slowly make out this figure who's kneeling next to me before standing.

... DAD!

What the hell?

He knows what I'm about to say and immediately shuts his mouth over my mouth along with raising a finger to his lip to gesture me to stay quiet. Good idea too. I was almost about to shout.

He lets me breathe and I quickly refill my lungs with air before questioning him.

"Dad! What are you doing here?" I sound somewhat urgent and panicky and it comes out as a barely below regular voice.

"I should be asking you that. What are YOU doing here? You should be in bed." Dad dodges my question before crossing his arms together, showing who should be questioning who at this point.

"I couldn't sleep, so I went out to the forest clearing to go get some air." I quickly improvise, hoping it would convince him. Same pose, along with a frown on his face now. Best to point him in a direction away from the gap related problems.

No, he didn't take it. He raises his eyebrows, giving me the, "Yeah right. What's really going on?" look.

"You couldn't just go outside of the house? What's the difference between this spot and home?" He counter-attacks me. I quickly try to conjure up another answer before silence would befall over us and add to his suspicion.

"This spot is just more comfortable with me ok? And what about you? What are you doing out so early in the morning?" I answer back and hurry to ask him my question again so he wouldn't throw another one at me.

"I heard a noise from downstairs and I followed you all the way here." He finally gives me an answer that puts another shock into my mind. I think he decides to take advantage by immediately asking another question. And it's one I can't answer.

"In the clearing. What was that...portal?" He hesitates for a moment before deciding that he can't seem to find the word for it. I admit, I think it's hard to describe it myself.

But he caught it! How did he see the gap! Isn't it supposed to remain invisible to normal people?

I almost forget what Renko and Maribel tell me. Since the gap is out of control, the possibility of it being seen rises. Dad must have been one of the luckier ones to see it. Unlucky on my part now.

"You and those two girls. You guys were talking about it. What is it?" He moves in for the kill to grab the information from me.

He overheard my argument with Renko too! That's enough proof for him to know I'm related to the gap!

"It's...nothing." I give him a pathetic answer and he knows he has me cornered good. I wouldn't be able to deny whatever he said or asked next.

"Nothing? It seems enough to get you a slap almost as hard as your mother's. And for you to shout to refuse to help them. What's really going on?" He presses on the things he overheard as he recalls me being slapped and me refusing to help Renko and Maribel to repair the gap.

I was at a dead-end now on telling him what I've been doing for the past few days. Endless possibilities opened to me along with consequences that I tried to foresee. If I told him, who knows what he might do. I don't. If I didn't, he might decide to ask Renko and Maribel about it. If he can see the gap, I don't think they can deny him any information.

No. I said to myself and decided that I wouldn't involve myself in this anymore. No matter how hard they try, I won't help.

"Screw this, I don't have to answer. I don't have anything to say to you." I give him a hard glare to try to intimidate him to stop asking me anymore. His facial expression of a frown changes to a determined one. He releases his arms from their locked position and stares at me as I run off back home.

I don't stop running at all. Down the sidewalk, past the overhead street lights, heading straight with home. My legs burned from sprinting after some time, but I don't stop until I reach my house door. My knees feel like collapsing on me and I fumble for my keys as I grab them from my pocket. Immediately after unlocking the door and entering in, I just run up the stairs, not caring if Mom woke up or not, headed right into my room and jumped facefirst onto my bed.

Dreamless sleep slowly comes as I hear the door close. It's Dad without a doubt.

The burning feeling in my legs stopped. The sweat I didn't notice that was trickling down me, soaked my pillow. My whole system slowly entered a resting mode. Finally. It only took a couple hours.

...

* * *

_The next day_

My eyes open. I temporarily forget about what happen yesterday as I rub the sleep out of my eyes that was making me blink several times.

Ugh. Despite sleeping, I felt like I never got any rest. What time is it?

"Eh-hem." It sounds like its coming from my... doorway. It's Dad. He's damn persistent about this.

"What do you want?" I ask him coldly, sitting up from my bed to face him properly.

He doesn't answer at first, but he enters my room instead and closes the door behind him.

"That gap. I may not know anything about it, but I'm thinking it's bad news." His instinctual guts hold him true. It is bad news. For the world that is.

I don't answer, just waiting for whatever he was going to ask me. I couldn't leave my room. He would only ask me sooner or later.

"Nothing? One of those girls asked for you to help fix the gap. Why?" He asks me, but I decide to simply give him the silent treatment. After all, isn't ignorance bliss?

He doesn't budge at all and he seems to be patient enough to wait for another hour. I don't.

"If you care about it so much, why don't you help them?" I throw a curveball answer to him and he seems a bit shocked from it. He regains his eye composure and it already seems like he prepared something for it.

"Because I don't know what's going on. You do don't you? Why else would they have argued with you?" Dad mentions both Maribel and Renko again calmly.

I have no answer for that.

"If it's that bad, then you're just running away from your own problems." He strikes my nerve and it immediately makes me snap at him like an angry dog.

"I'm not running away!" I forcefully shout at him, giving me a tempting urge to punch him right in the face.

"Then what can I assume! Why aren't you helping them! They care for you and trust you if they ask you for help!" He tries to remove my barriers down with his assumptions, and boy is he successful right now.

"You don't understand at all!" I can only deny him at every stop, but he's slowly and surely cornering me again.

"Then help me understand! I might not know much, but it sounds urgent anyway. You should be helping them, especially because you seem to be involved in all this! Why though!" Dad raises and lowers his voice consecutively, continuing to hit me at every weak spot I had right now.

I couldn't take it anymore. I shouted back to him reflexively on one of the main points why I had stopped helping at all.

"Because my friend died because of me! Ok? You get it! She died!" I shout at him through tears now continuing to look at him in the eyes.

He looks absolutely surprised that I just told him that. His eyes widen in absolute surprise and he pats my back to give me some sympathy.

"So that's why. But, you're still running away. I get that a friend's death means a lot, but what do you think she would think if you decided to just give up on helping those two girls? It already looks like you've done so anyway." Dad's voice goes quieter during those lines and he still scolds me for not helping them again.

"You still don't get it! She was a part of me!" I continue to cry out in pain to him without even thinking of what I just said.

He...blushes? What the hell?

"I...see. I didn't realize that you've gone that far within such a short time." Now he tries to patronize me even more.

But now he's misassuming things! What are you thinking? How did you even get that thought!

The atmosphere just completely changed within those 20 seconds. I don't think it's bad though. In fact, I think it's... actually working.

"No it's not like that." I say in a quieter tone, trying to hold in my laugh at how he misassumed at my relationship with the Intuition.

How would I tell him that the Intuition existed inside me? No matter how I look at it, it's impossible without looking like a maniac or an insane person.

"If you've gone that far, then how would she look at you now? The same man who had her respect? Or a boy who is simply scared?" He goes back into serious mode. The angry aura that I believe I had disappeared with that small joke/assumption that Dad pulled. I don't think he realizes right now, but thanks to this accidental mood change, I feel better. A lot less guilty.

"For the last time, I didn't do _that_." I try to convince him that nothing happened which was the truth. My mind resolved to answering his past few questions? Am I really just running away right now? What would she say if she was still with me? Nothing positive I'm sure.

And with that, my sense of responsibility came back. The old guilt of letting her die mostly dissipated away along with my failure, but was replaced by a minor thought of pride. I can bare with it though.

Even though the Intuition is gone, I'm sure she wouldn't want me to sit my ass down and stay put while something is going on. No matter how lazy Reimu is, she always go out to solve whatever is going on.

All right! My mind is made up. I'll go and help Renko and Maribel to the end then!

The only problem is Dad right now. How do I get him out of here?

"Oh... In that case, sorry for the misassumption." He apologizes for his blunder, and I can already imagine what would happen if Mom got word of all this. IT wouldn't be very pretty to say the least. It would be messy, very messy. I shiver at the thought already.

"Fine. I'll go help them. But whatever went on here can't leave the room. You have to at least promise me that." I silently plead him him to spread of what happens. The less who know, the better.

Dad's a bit reluctant but he nods his head.

"Sometime, I'll tell you what's going on. But it's best that others have no clue on what's going on there." I try to add on to the persuasion that it shouldn't be spread. Not doing a great job right now.

He nods his head again before standing up to leave the room.

"I'll be going then. I have to leave to work soon. Make sure you do your job on doing whatever." He waves goodbye to me before exiting my room in a cool manner.

I'll be heading out to the forest again. Maybe Maribel and Renko are still asleep.

7:31. How long did Dad and I talk?

Whatever. I better leave soon. Breakfast can wait.

I walk out of my room and rush down the stairs to see Dad preparing to leave too. The door is already open and he's about to enter the car.

"Wait! I shout out to him to catch his attention. And he looks at me in a weird way.

"What is it?" His annoyed tone stings me and makes me wonder if what I had was such a good idea.

"Could I get a ride to the forest? I really don't want to walk there. Ehehe." I scratch my head in embarassment, and I give him that sheepish grin. He sighs then beckons me into the passenger seat.

He let me in at least. I don't have to walk this time. Bonus!

* * *

**Real World: Forest Clearing**

**Renko/Maribel**

"R-Renko! What are we going to do?" Maribel panics as TV static starts appearing inside of the gap. It continued to attempt to rip into the surrouding area around more, making it bigger.

"I don't know! Just hold it together! I'm trying to set up the machine again. Damn these junky parts!" Renko quickly answers back, rapidly hitting switches and buttons onto the machine that they had used earlier to help stablize the gap.

"I'm not sure if I can hold it any longer!" Maribel struggles to use what gap power she had to stop the distorted portal from spreading any further.

"Hang on! Just a little longer. Done!" Renko shouts back as she steps back to let the invention assist Maribel .

Indeed, the now-wider gap started to close up, although very slowly. The static continued to resist rapidly inside of it, making it difficult for the machine and Maribel to close up more of the space.

"Guys! Guys!" A voice they both knew came from the bushes behind them.

"Akyris!" Maribel shouted, though Renko did not look as relieved!

"What's going on? What's happening to the gap?" He takes a quick look at the gap, somewhat understanding the intensity of the situation/

"Why do you want to know? Didn't you say you weren't going to help anymore?" Renko argues with Akyris, but he didn't seem to care too much.

"Looking at Maribel and this thing, I don't think this is a great time to argue. Just tell me what I can do to help!" Akyris desperately cried out to give his assistance.

It was silent for a moment as Renko seemed to be pondering on whether she could trust him again. However, the machine next to her started to overheat and she knew she no longer had a choice.

"I think... this gap might be out of control enough to send you into another incident instead of using your computer... All right! Jump into the gap!" Renko decides on temporarily letting Akyris help them.

"W-What! Jump in there? F-Fine!" He shouts in shock before starting to sprint toward the gap at full speed, preparing to dive into it.

Maribel continued to swear, looking just as shocked at Renko's decision and choice for Akyris.

"We need a talk after this Akyris! You better come out alive this time!" Renko shouts as he finally neared the gap and dived in.

"GRAAAHHHHHHHHHH!" He cries in pain in a distorted tone.

The figure of Akyris that was clearly seen in the gap now split into pieces, seemingly becoming one with the gap.

"Good luck Akyris.. Please do not die this time. I can only save you so many times..." Maribel whispered to herself as she completely focused her thoughts into holding the gap together.

* * *

**Gensokyo: ?**

**Akyris/?**

DAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

**SNAP! CRACK!**

I fall through and break through many tree branches until finally, I approach the ground.

Ooof! My back! Agghhhhh!

I take a few moments to silence the pain I had and slowly get up off of the ground.

Damn it! Why did I fall out of the sky? I get hit two consecutive times for listening to Renko like that. I felt like my insides were just being completely ripped apart when I jumped in that gap! Too bad there's no anasthesia to numb all that crap. Then I wouldn't have minded.

Thinking of Renko, it looks like she doesn't trust me anymore. I only have myself to blame for that. I sigh to myself as I get back up the floor rather slowly.

I'm holding something... It's the broom! The trusty broom that broke when I got hit from my reflected Master Spark! It almost looks brand new!

I almost give it a hug, until it decides to fly out of my grasp and I trip onto the floor.

Ack! Broom! What the hell!

If this is my broom, then...I'm Marisa again!

All right! Now then, where is it? Where is it?

In my apron? Oh, I don't have one.

I tough myself all over, looking for the special item that Marisa had. Under my hat maybe?

I pull my still huge Witch hat off of my head and something falls onto the floor. Ahh there it is!

My Hakkero! I still have it too!

My clothes were still of Marisa's. However, this time, the color scheme was now blue and I now had a scarf which was blue as well!

Just to further confirm this, I pulled the nearest lock of hair I had in front of me to take a look at it. It's blond. Yup, Marisa. Not Reimu.

So what game is this? I don't see any clues around. The only thing suspicious is this weird yin-yang orb flying next to me.

It's about the size of a baseball looking at it. It's moving around me too. Is it alive or something?

I grab the yin-yang orb tightly and poke it as if it were a dead body.

_Hey! What are you doing Marisa? Stop messing around with the orb!_

What the? Where is that coming from? Who's talking to me? A ghost? A spirit?

I look around, completely baffled at the voice seemingly coming out of nowhere. Don't tell me I'm cursed!

"Who's talking to me?" I pull up a bravado tone, actually fearful of this mystery voice.

_Over here! From the orb! _

The orb? It's coming from that direction.

I hear a sigh coming from it.

_We're still going to the cave. It's just past that flower field._

"Wait, who are you? What cave?" I'm talking to another inanimate object. The broom was one thing since it can move on it's own but this orb can talk! If this doesn't make me insane, nothing else does right now.

_It's Nitori! Don't you remember? You said you would go investigate that cave that evil spirits were coming from._

N-Nitori? That girl who attacked me with spell cards during Mountain of Faith?

I instantly feel a million times more uncomfortable and tense up. She was indirectly involved in my death after all.

I said before that I wouldn't hold anything personal against her but... I can't help but hold her somewhat responsible. I can't say for sure, but she must have been able to build that barrier. If she built that camouflage on herself, it's always possible that she could've built it.

Although I'm reluctant to, I have to stay friendly with her. She's giving me information right now. No point in acting hostile with her. I wonder if she knows that she's teaming up with the person that she knowingly or unknowingly killed.

Or maybe, this incident that I'm in doesn't timeline with the last one at all?

Gahhh, this is just baffling me. Forget thinking about it now.

"Evil spirits. Do you think it's an incident?" False curiosity goes into that question which goes to Nitori.

_It could be. We have to go down there to find out though._

Down the cave. Sounds creepy already.

All right Broom. Come over here. I gotta fly on you again.

It shakes the wooden end at me and each time I try to grab it, it evades my grip every time. It goes higher and higher until it's out of range and it shakes it's rear, if you can call it that, at me.

Oh that's it! That's the last straw Broom. You're going to get it now. No stupid object that can move will insult me like that.

I aimed the hakkero in my hand at it, threatening to power it up and shoot the broom down if it dared disobey me.

Whether it could sweat or not, I don't know, but my threat "persuades" it to come down peacefully and without trouble.

Try anything funny and you'll face a spark. Got it?

It stands on the straw end and nods with the stick end quickly before floating in the air in a horizontal position. That's better. This is almost as bad as the last broom I had. Thankfully, it let me on in the end.

Nitori the orb, heh orb, flies up with me as I soar higher and higher on the broom, into the air to get a clear view of everything.

No questions asked from anyone. Nothing to overcomplicate things. Good.

Past the flower field. That one over there? There's a HUGE mass of sunflowers over there. It's incredibly hard to miss it. There's some rocks statures together way over there past it. Is that where the cave is then?

"Just to make sure. Over at those giant rocks over there? Where it looks like a mountain?" I ask to clarify if this was the right direction to head off to.

_Yes. That's where it is. Please be careful. I heard from others that a really powerful youkai lives in the flower fields._

Yikes. From the fear in her voice, she doesn't sound one to be screwed with. I'll keep that in mind.

Now, off to this cave, And our next incident. Too bad I don't know the name of it.

* * *

**A.N: Meehhhhh. Did such a bad job on this one. Much too lazy to try and rewrite everything. There were days where I wrote the whole day in a good writing mood, but still end up feeling like something is missing. Huge thanks to Xavic btw. This chapter is dedicated to you for helping me through some tough crap I had to deal with. Dunno how long I might've stayed in that state, but this chapter would've been done at a much later time if not for you. Thanks for reading!**


	14. Incident 3: Subterranean Animism Part 1

**Author's Notes: Yoooooooooo! Here's da new chapter. I have been super busy lately. Looking at it now, ever since school restarted, I never found the time to try and write this. Then I got lazy when I actually did try, so I went to go do something else often. Nonetheless, here's Subterranean Animism's first few parts, and I hope you enjoy!**

* * *

**Gensokyo: Underground Cave**

**Akyris/Marisa**

That was single-handedly, now the most dangerous place in Gensokyo that I now know. I will never return there. Ever!

I swear, I almost saw my life's end.**  
**

* * *

_Flashback_

**Gensokyo: Garden of the Sun**

A sunflower field. It looks nice enough for someone to relax at, doesn't it?

Strangely, it's giving off this eerie feeling right now. Like the flowers have these glares on you and dare you to come closer, just so they can shoot you. And maybe eat you alive.

"Hey. Nitori."

_"Hmm?" _The Yin-yang orb rotates to the front of me, noticing that I was looking downwards.

"Is that the youkai down there?" I point toward someone holding a parasol while watering the sunflowers. "The one with the parasol and red skirt."

She faces downwards maybe? It's hard to tell, before looking at me and giving it some form of a nod.

"That youkai looks harmless doesn't it? No point in interacting with whoever though." I voice my comments to Nitori and she freezes.

"_I-Is she looking at us?" _She sounds absolutely scared right now. It can't be that bad. Right?

She puts her watering can down and aims her parasol at me like it's some sort of shield.

Is she doing something? I think there's some kind of white orb at the tip.

"_Ahh! Fly away! Fly away!" _Nitori panics as she starts flying quickly in the direction of the cave.

The open parasol aims at me, looking like it had finished charging up for something and I look in horror as a Master Spark flies straight for me!

"DAHH! Master Spark incoming!" I barely dodge the huge laser as the same buzz noise that comes from all of the major sparks so far.

What's going on! Why am I getting fired at!

Escaped seemed like the best option. I could barely, if not, only fire one Master Spark back at her.

And here comes another one! She already looks like the type to be really relentless!

I shift both left and right to avoid being a sitting duck, hoping to make her at least tire out or give up.

I fly faster and faster, going at breakneck speed, not caring if I crash at all. Anything to get away from whoever is spamming the crap out of the sparks right now.

That is some ridiculous stamina she has! That's the 6th one now! This is stupid!

I can't just let her free shoot me like this! Take this!

I turn around to face her direction, intending to shoot back at her with my own star bullets.

The familiar sensation through arms surge again, but what comes out from my hands aren't the ones from Mountain of Faith.

Instead, they were medium speed mini green rocket shaped bullets. Firing just like a tank that has it's machine gun attachment without overheating at all.

The missiles or rockets are slower than the stars sadly. Until they reach midway and speed up.

I should get used to this. I hope.

I missed her, but it seemed to make her stop her attacks.

She looks around and behind her to scan the surrounding area that I hit instead of her. Her sunflowers.

When she turns back to me, I take a look in her red eyes and it shoots a winter chill down my spine. My mind processed something very clearly.

Fly away! Fly, you fool!

One last Master Spark flies right past me, even faster and I could have sworn, stronger than before. That sent me packing immediately and back to the escape objective.

Too close for comfort! Faster damn it!

Must be thinking of a way to get payback at me now. I think I got away since I'm really far from the sunflower field now.

The broom slows down a bit for me, corresponding with my thoughts.

...

_"Behind you!" _Nitori warned me of another incoming death spark.

* * *

That was TOO damn close. The broom decided to go ahead and shift into maximum speed after getting slightly singed on my leg.

I almost fell off the broom, I'll admit. Very sudden for me to finally catch up with what was happening again.

Few moments later, here I am. Catching my breath at this cave that leads to who knows where.

Dear Life Diary, if the journey to any place involves that huge garden again, I am finding an alternate route. Thank you.

Onto the cave now.

"Hey Nitori. It looks pretty dark down there. How am I supposed to supposed to find my way down if it's too dark?" It indeed did look to dark. The sun barely pierced into the dark depths of it and I thought of whatever horrid things could exist in it.

Do I believe in ghosts though? Maybe monsters too?

She doesn't give an answer for a bit, so I assume she has no idea on how either.

Sigh. Off into the unknown pit of death. Yup.

I'm somewhat listening to a stranger in actual terms though, or my killer if I want to be more accurate. Call me crazy.

Eww, a murky cave. I'm already feeling the urge to turn back. It smells like poop that's been left in here for weeks and its unbearable enough that I have to cover my nose and breathe through my mouth.

It's wet with puddles on the ground too. Like that makes things better.

Get me out of this stupid situation, please. Whatever divine being out there. I already know that it's too late now though.

"Youkai Mountain. There was a new shrine up there right? Who lives up there?" I was rather curious to know who was up there? I never made it to the top of course.

_"Oh? Do you mean the Moriya Shrine?"_ Her response comes rather excitedly. Maybe she likes them?

"Is that it? The Moriya Shrine?"

Wouldn't Reimu object to this? Now there's two shrines in Gensokyo and I'm willing to bet the inhabitants would put all their faith in the Moriya one rather than the Hakurei one.

"_Yes! Lady Kanako, Lady Suwako along with Miss Sanae live up there. Everyone around the mountain likes them very much."_

It already sounds like the shrine business is looking good. Wouldn't Reimu be mad.

"The youkai too?" It was honestly stupid of me to ask. Do youkai ever pray or believe in things?

_"Yes! Even the youkai believe in them!" _And she sounds like her birthday came with a bit juicy gift. But huh? The Moriya Shrine even get belief from the youkais?

Reimu, I hope you aren't hearing this. Your local youkai really don't like you! I wonder why.

Besides us talking to each other, it's quiet. Too quiet. Then it would be a trap. Peppy Hare said.

The path in here was straightforward so far. Just one open road filled with random assortments of rocks everywhere. And cave water, let's call it that.

"By the way, how are you talking to me through the yin-yang orb?" It has a mouth. It should because it's completely mind killing me right now.

"_Well you see, I wanted to see what you were doing while you were investigating what was going on from the cave. And I wanted to talk to you at the same. I couldn't think of a.."_And she drones on about why she had the radio or whatever take the form of a Yin-yang Orb.

Just to keep it going, Nitori went on about how easy it was to build a two way radio between the two yin-yang orbs.

Sorry to say, but I'm never going to comprehend what you say. You won't know that though. I only know a little bit of this and that cuz I never bothered to delve in deeper. Don't yell at me for it, Lokon already criticized me for that.

If she built that camouflage and that barrier and those turrets from her backpack, why am I still surprised that she was successful in this special radio?

"Hmm? Is someone here?" I hear another female's voice in a random direction from me. Not Nitori's.

Are there ever any guys in Gensokyo? I wonder.

I tense up right away, not sure if this person would be an attacker. I continued to walk though, making my awareness rise higher so I wouldn't be caught off guard.

With how it's been so far, even minor people seem to be bosses. Could this one be the first boss? Mid-boss?

I let my mind have it's own fun for a bit, reminding myself of a certain character named "Mid-Boss," from a game I played.

My eyes somewhat adjust to this darkness and I make out the shape of a circle on the ceiling.

Something brown, a wooden object maybe? On the top of it, wait inside of it, was a girl with green hair. The wooden object she's in turns out to be a bucket.

Why is she in a bucket? A bucket youkai? What crap is this?

She hides in it for a sec before picking up something inside the bucket.

She lifts it over her head, and it looks like some kind of blue flame. It's sort of floating between her hands now, and she throws it at me!

Geez! No matter where I go, I always get attacked by random people!

I get scared at it for a bit before jumping out of the way and rolling to safety. It explodes against the ground and I don't take a second look at the small crater it formed as another one comes at me.

Scary! I don't want to be blown to pieces like that!

Solid ground is harder than human bones in the end after all!

Another one approaches me and I try shooting it with the magic missiles this time. The youkai flame seems to burn away all my magic missiles into nothing and I start panicking a little.

_"How about just shooting that bucket directly? That might work." _Nitori has a point. Instead of countering with everything, take out the main enemy.

Or we can do two at once! You can't burn away a spark! The Touhou Universe version of a laser!

My hakkero aims directly at this bucket girl and I fire a minor Narrow Spark at both the blue flame and her. It doesn't disappear, but it halts right in it's air flight and pierces right through the side of the wooden bucket, creating a fist sized whole in it.

All of a sudden, it drops onto the floor on its end, no longer floating in the air. The handle wasn't supported by anything, so it baffles me on how it was flying.

That was anticlimatic. No spell cards? All I did was fire my regular shot and a narrow spark and its over. And dodge one attack.

But now, let's look at our mystery attacker. This doesn't seem like the first boss. The previous one's I fought so far were much stronger. Wriggle brought me down fast and I got really tired against Shizuha and Minoriko.

I put my hakkero away and cautiously walk over to view the inside of the barrel, curious as to who this girl is.

She looked scared, and even though it was dark, I could see her green hair. 2 really small pigtails adorned the right and left sides of her hair, but I couldn't see her clothes.

She really did look no older than maybe 8 or 9. Is that why she was so easy?

"Is someone in here? Is it a youkai?"

A voice echoed throughout the walls of the deeper end of the cave and I figured it wasn't from this girl.

"You should go while you can. I won't think twice of blowing you up next time." I offer the bucket girl a chance to leave and she takes it. Despite a hole in it, she flies away while inside of it deeper into the cave.

Creepy. But there's still someone here. Who is it?

**DOINK**

A huge white spider string drops from the ceiling and out comes a girl dangling.

"GAHHH!" I suddenly yelp out as a girl literally drops right in front of me upside down!

I'm too surprised to realize what I'm doing as I bat this girl away with my broom, flinging her into the air, causing her to scream. As she stopped and soared into the air, she immediately fired back at me red and blue sphere bullets. Not too big, and not too hard. I can get through this. If I reach her again, I'll point blank her with Stardust Reverie.

Planning my next move already, I sit onto my broom and soar off after her.

The cave is actually bigger than I thought. There's actually a lot of room to maneuver around.

Faster, come on! I can reach her!

I don't feel like I'm flying any faster, even though I am since it's starting to get harder to dodge what she's shooting at me.

_"Be careful! I can help you too if it's too much!" _Nitori lets me know.

Any help I get, as long as it doesn't kill me or anything, helps.

**{"Trap Sign "Capture Web"}" **The spider youkai shoots up two complete walls of red diamond shapes leaving me enclosed in a space with nowhere to move. It breaks formation to scatter randomly across the cave.

I can still get through this. I'll just ram right through it!

Feeling reckless, I simply just went full speed into the bullets, dissipating it completely and leaving no trace of it. It stung a little, but nothing I can't take yet. Eat this!

Still going at what I felt was ludicrous speed, I rammed right into this cave youkai effectively in the stomach and her shots all disappear. The recoil stings me a bit, but it was worth it to take down a spell card.

But she recovers faster than I expect. Once she flies some distance away from me, she's already launching her next set of bullets at me. The same blue and red ones from before.

Same ones? Even you must know I can easily graze those.

As I come up closer to her on my broom, she launches the exact same spell card again!

Hey, didn't I break her spell card? Why is she still shooting!

As I move using the same method as before, a blue laser shoots out, only a couple feet away from me. I jerk to the left and move along the path that I'm being forced to move along.

Wahh! I got lucky there! I didn't see that coming!

The same bullets that she had also shot before, phased through the laser and slowly approached me.

Double shot dodging. There's still plenty of room to move around. I'll wait for a sec and see if an opening comes up.

It indeed does come and as soon as the laser thins out and disappears, I rush to hurry and take out my own hakkero to launch my own at her.

Yeah! Got her good!

It sends her spinning backwards and I try to ride the momentum to hurry and follow up on that.

She manages to completely stop in midair, but when she turns to me, she looks absolutely scared. She closes her eyes and completely panics, making her activate her spell card.

**{Miasma Sign "Filled Miasma"}**, I hear her cry out in a last resort tone as a thick red fog floods the area around her, obscuring my vision of her.

I rapidly shoot out a couple of missiles into it, though it has no effect on it at all. It looks like it just gets absorbed into the miasma.

Ahh crap! Retreat!

As I gain distance from the fog by flying in the direction the fog is going, my escape path gets cut off... by a dead end.

Shit! End of the line!

"Nitori, whatever you have to save me, use it please! I don't care what it is, there's nothing to lose!" I bark out at Nitori desperately as the miasma inched closer and closer to me.

30 feet, 20 feet, 10 feet.

_"Here! Blast shield!"_ A green wall instantly appears in front of me and completely around me, forming a green barrier. Hexagon shapes filled the gaps and as the spell card engulfed me, nothing seemed to happen. It couldn't touch me.

"Thank you! I'm really lucky to have you around right now!' I sigh in relief with the convenient shield that Nitori had given me.

_"You should try and find her before my shield runs out. You only have about 15 seconds before it runs out. I'm using the Yin-yang Orb to transfer the power and it can only hold for a while before it has to recharge."_ Nitori's rundown on her life-saving barrier shocked me a bit, with the length being too short with how I would have expected it.

My objectives formed in my mind as I went in a search and destroy mode for my enemy.

My mind ticked on the countdown of how much time was left before I would have to breathe in the miasma.

Gotta find her! Where is she?

6 seconds, 5 seconds, 4 seconds.

I can't find her! Forget it! There's too much to search through! I'll just have to do one big bang attack and hope it hits her!

I pull out the hakkero and shove it to the front of me, making the shield around me disappear.

Bad idea though, because now, I can't breathe.

I cough without any control over it, and I have no idea where I'm aiming at all since it looks the same everywhere. The words popped into my mind as I called out my own spell card.

**"{Love Sign "Master Spark"}!" **It came out awfully weak as I coughed mid-spell card, trying to declare it.

The yellow-whiteish Master Spark rang true though, already searing into the air as it launched from the outstretched arm holding the hakkero with a second arm to support it.**  
**

I struggle to hold my aim and my blurry eyes clear. Going unconscious now would probably mean the end. I won't die a second time.

The Spark goes off into a random area where I'm pointing and as I try to move it, I find that I can't. Even though it's dense energy, my arms won't allow me to move the hakkero to steer it.

Too heavy. The slight, burnt sing in the air and the buzz noise distracts me from the surrounding area around me. The Master Spark bursts right through the youkai's spell card, forming a gaping hole to replace it when it was over.

Did I hit her?

Nope, I didn't. Only cracked walls and broken stalagmites in its place. There's no one there! But I have some air now!

I take deep breaths to recover what I lost and the urge to cough disappears. My dizzy feeling and lightheadedness ebbed away too, letting me take a couple seconds to unlock my arms from the Master Spark pose.

Pain flowed through my thin arms as I bent my firing arm and now the fog is starting to envelop me again!

Quickly and faster than my mind can think, I force the broom under me and edge it to fly towards the recent gap created from only seconds ago.

I can't help but think of this as one of those escape scenes from the movies. Walls closing in or giant explosions, this was probably the closest experience right now that I would have. If this wasn't a life of death situation, I would enjoy this.

I reach the end of the clearing and reaching out to Nitori seemed like my only choice right now as I hit a dead-end again.

"Nitori! Nitori! I'm trapped again! Can you put up a second shield?" I shout into thin air for some form of assistance.

_"Y-yes_! _I can! But if I do, I'll overheat it and I won't be able to do it again until I fix it." _She warns me of what would happen, but I don't care at this point. Got resources? Why bother saving it when you're gonna die?

"Use it anyway! Go! Go!" No hesitation came from me despite the risks it would hold if used again.

I suck in a deep breath and shut my eyes as if expecting something blunt to hit me when the fog already touched my face.

The ever same green barrier from before takes some time forming and I open my eyes to see me safeguarded again.

Another 15 seconds of this. Master Spark didn't work, though I think maybe I can still use it.

I need something to blow away all this fog somewhere else so I can find her easier. What though?

Before I get to question anything further though, the shield Nitori put up for me, started fading away.

Desperate curiosity grasped me and I started feeling the worst emotion possible now.

Fear.

"Nitori! What's going on! Why is your barrier disappearing on me? That wasn't even 6 seconds!"

_"It's out of control! It won't hold up because we used two shields consecutively in such a short amount of time without letting my Blasting Shield cool down!"_

Damn it!

Wait! That's it! Unstable energy, like nuclear plants need some kind of control so it'll hold together! If the shield can't hold itself together, then it's out of control! Out of control energy can cause explosions! An explosion is sure to blow all this crap away!

It sounded completely random and I think many would've thought that it was completely absurd. Being a little crazy goes a long way though. There's no time to be dubious and I have nothing to lose right now!

I pull out the hakkero again and touch the fading light green barrier again, remembering to take a deep breath this time, watching it disappear.

Ok now!

I aim it somewhere else, hoping with everything that a miracle would occur. Master Spark, if it fired, could always buy me more time and another plan if I need. If I get lucky, I'll hit her too!

The words didn't appear in my mind this time, and instead of glowing yellow, the hakkero's kanji flashed a dark red instead. A wave of white was absorbed into it, before flashing even faster.

_"Look out! That's a time bomb you're holding! Throw it away! Hurry!"_ Nitori warns me to hurry and get rid of it.

Ahh! R-right!

So long hakkero! I'm sorry! Hee-yah!

I throw out into the open and I close my eyes.

...

A **booming** explosion rang out and the heat's intensity made me feel like I was in a volcano. Red, white, orange, all meshed together as the hakkero exploded. Rocks crashed onto my body parts everywhere and now I understand why people hit the dirt when an explosion nears.

I protected my face with my arms and hands and that youkai's spell card was completely shoved aside, making everything clear again. Nothing to obscure my line of sight anymore.

The heat slowly faded away, as did the explosion, leaving only smoke in it's wake and I looked around for that youkai.

There she is!

I jump onto the broom again and fly over to her floating figure.

Eat Comet Missile!

To whoever this was, I must have been flying at an extreme speed cause when I crashed right into her chest area, I might have cracked a couple ribs if she had any, because I could have sworn I heard a crack.

She flies back a great distance away from me before showing no movement as she thud against the floor on her back in defeat. She puffed out a gasp of breath before looking unconscious.

I gave her a few seconds, to see if she would stand up and continue to fight, but she laid flat, signaling finally, a victory.

...

We won!

_"Wow! Good job! I thought you weren't going to make it when we were surrounded again, by that miasma." _I'll agree there. If it wasn't for you, I would've been a goner for sure.

Ahh damn. That was a really close call.

Since my hakkero exploded, I won't be able to shoot Master Sparks anymore. Now I'm down a spell card. Sob.

Losing what might have been my best chance to get through this incident was a huge blow to my part. And I'm tired already. I wasn't really hit, but I feel like going home to sleep already. That sounds nice too.

Now, which way is deeper in? I'm lost since I had to completely focus on defeating whoever I just fought.

If I don't move soon and that youkai wakes up, she might try and fight me again. I'm in no condition and sure as hell, she isn't either. Best not take any risks.

A win could always turn to a short-lived one at any time.

"_Ahh! Marisa! Over there! There's something on the ground!" _The Yin-yang orb she was communicating with flew over to something on the ground deeper inside.

It looks like a kanji... Wait.

I take a light jog to where Nitori would be if she was actually here and...

It's the hakkero! It survived!

_"This is what you used to fight, right?"_ She asks me, and I nod, forgetting that she might not be able to see me nod.

It's all black and sooty though. But it made it through! That means I can still... My hopes plummeted a little when I saw a thick mark on the back of it.

It was damaged. A giant scratch ran through the middle section.

Does this mean that it'll break if I keep using it then?

Wonderful. Now I not only have limited use of it, it'll get further damaged everytime I do fire from it. That's what I assume.

But it held together and I'm satisfied. The only way I can fire off Master Sparks without tiring out so fast is to use Nitori's Blasting Shields to fuel it. And it can't come often either since it overheats.

But then, what about my Narrow Sparks? Now I'm even down one of my weaker sparks too! This sucks!

Speaking of overheating...

"Hey, Nitori. Since the Blasting Shield got worked up, what are you going to do about it?" I ask her for her take on her little invention.

_"I'll be able to get it working again. Piece of cake! I just need time, that's all." _

Time. I don't feel timewise rushed unlike Mountain of Faith.

I wonder if I'll have to do Mountain of Faith over again. Fighting Hina was hell itself and the thought of fighting her again without the Intuition around this time, makes it sound like it's impossible.

Maybe I took it for granted that everyone would help me through this. In Imperishable Night, I had both Reimu's Intuition and Yukari to help me through it. Even though I screwed up horribly, in Mountain of Faith, I had the Intuition again.

That brings my mind back to why she did decided to put out a last-dtich attack, ending her existence.

_"Marisa? Is something wrong?"_ Nitori asks me worried, breaking me out of my rambling state of mind.

I brood too much. I feel like a certain somebody right now. Kudos to those non-brooders.

Ahh, I better answer her. Leaving someone on a question queue usually leaves them unsatisfied and they'll be more irritated if it continues. At least, from my experience. Or it could be from the people around me.

"I'm fine. By the way, can a youkai or fairy ever die?" I pretend to up my curiosity so it sounds more convincing. I'm sure I'm doing a bad job at it.

But it was salso omething that nudged me everytime I fought. Despite being inferior at this point to most, if not, everybody in Gensokyo, I couldn't help but be worried that I "killed" someone.

_"No, you can never 'kill' a youkai or fairy here. I thought you knew that already since you always seem to blast fairies away." _Hearing that makes me feel REALLY relieved.

"Then what about the spell cards? A lot of them look like they can kill." It wouldn't be fair if youkais and fairies wouldn't die, but humans could.

_The Spell Cards can badly damage, and so can your danmaku and whatever else you want to use. But they never can kill. Reimu made it so that danmaku wouldn't aim to kill. That youkai's giant spark would only burn you badly, but not kill you._

Then I died on my own while sinking into the river! If I could just swim to the top, then I could've been fine! And that means that I wouldn't have died by Hina, even if I got wounded!

"Nitori. What about the amount of times you can use it? She also fired a ton of sparks at me. Why can I only fire one?" Finally, the question that baffles most is how much I can use the spell card.

_"You can use it as many times as you like! But you have to be careful that you use it too often, otherwise you'll tire yourself out. Spell cards can be used continuously until you choose to cancel it, switch to another one, get hurt enough to stop, or run out of energy. All spell cards drain your energy and if you tire out, you won't be able to fight back much. Reimu made it this way too so that everybody has a chance to win. The stronger the spell card, the more it drains you! So even if your opponent was someone obviously not as strong as you, you could still lose if you keep using your strongest spell card because you'll tire out. You can use as many spell cards as you like until you tire out. Once your spell card is stopped, you can't use it again so be careful on how you want to use it. The moment you get too tired, you're at a big disadvantage. Once you take too much damage so that you can't get back up, then the battle is over."_

What a mouthful. So to make things simpler, the stronger the spell card, the more it makes me tired, but I can use it as many times as I want until I stop it, decide to use another spell card, or get forcefully stopped. Once any of that happens, I can't use it again. Then this applies to the weaker Spell Cards too. The battle ends when you can't stand back up to keep fighting. So everything is on my endurance._  
_

Wow...

I feel so deprived for not knowing all this. I should have asked Yukari all this once she knew I wasn't really Reimu. All this time, I've been fighting without knowing everything that was going on.

Aggh! I need time to process all this. This is too much.

As the endless cave continues on and on, my patience starts to thin. Bit by bit it goes away, until there's a giant fault on the ground. There was a bridge to cross it, but why take it when you can fly instead?

Mounting up on my broom, I casually fly over it, until I hear some whispering.

I'm not delusional yet. Someone is probably here.

"You have a broom to fly over? I'm so jealous... I want a broom like that... Where did she get the hat?" Mutters from around me reach my ears, but I can't tell where it's coming from.

Nitori's gaze, can't tell which side she's looking at, looks around the area to find nobody.

"Another youkai? Think we'll get attacked again?" I aimlessly say to Nitori, searching around as well while flying over the huge slash on the ground.

_"I'm not sure. I finished fixing up the Blast Shield_, _but make sure you don't use it carelessly this time! I just made this!" _There must be a tick mark and a pout face behind that yin-yang orb.

"That depends if I need to."

Survival over resources! Sorry, I'm doing what I can to keep on living and not dying.

Wait, not die anymore, but fail ultimately still.

"If I beat you... Do I get your boom?" The dulled voice comes again and I start getting a bit scared.

_"Ahh! Over there!"_

The warning from Nitori makes me look over to the other side of the bridge area where there was a girl with curly blond hair.

She starts flying over to me, and I aim the broom toward her, ready to move anytime if I was attacked.

"No, you can't get my broom. I need it to fly." Annoyance consumes me at this underground dweller.

Why is she asking for my items anyway? What, is this a collector youkai now?

If it is, ZUN made some really weird youkais.

My purpose sidetracks for a bit when I ask her,"Who are you? Why do you want my things?"

"I'm Parsee. I want your scarf too..." It's her last words before Parsee decides to finally starts firing some of the bullets that Mystia shot at me.

I knew it would be a fight!

I fly back a bit to stay cautious and navigate my way vertically and horizontally to stay away from all the stray bullets, firing off a few of my missiles at her.

Most of them miss because I'm moving and shooting at the same time while she's moving too, and the few that hit doesn't seem to faze her much, but her eye flinches when some of them make contact with her.

I screw up a couple times too, stupidly getting hit by bullets I probably shouldn't be getting hit by, since there's a lot of room to maneuver.

Not that they hurt that much.

**"{Jealousy Sign "Green-Eyed Monster"}" **Already time for the first spell card?

The bullets that I previously dodge all disappear, instead, getting replaced by a combination of small green spheres along with the giant versions of it.

They instantly form together on a set path for me, and I make the obvious decision to fly away again. There seems to be no way to dodge it since she doesn't really shoot the bullets or leave any gaps for me to graze through.

It continuously follows me where I go, and it feels as if I'm fighting in a current Cat and Mouse situation, only I'm the mouse

Either by a stroke of luck, she doesn't seem to move while controlling the spell card and she's really open to attack now.

Comet Missile straight to her! YAHHHH!

**BAM!**

Direct!

...Hit?

No way! That should have hit her good!

A forcefield that was in front of Parsee that I had not seen, had completely blocked my fly charge and I end up flipping backwards, hanging onto my broom for dear life.

"Did you like that? It's my way of protection by using all the jealousy I collect..." She somewhat taunts me, but I pay it no mind while I'm busy holding onto my flying object.

_"Look out! You're gonna hit the bullets behind you!" _

The warning is right on time and I halt the broom, putting it on a complete stop in the air.

New plan while dodging all this! What am I gonna do?

_"What about using the Master Spark? I haven't seen anybody that can stand up to it yet."_

"No, I can't. My hakkero is cracked and there's no telling when it'll break up on me if I use it. Or my Narrow Spark."

I'll save it for tight spots. There has to be a way out of this.

Maybe if I try Comet Missile a couple more times, her forcefield will crack!

Here we go again then! Comet Missile!

I clench my teeth together, flying at ludicrous speed directly at Parsee again.

This time I'll...!

**BAM!**

Break damn it! Come on!

I collide against Parsee's mysterious shield again, intent on breaking through and crushing her.

I fail again. And fly back off of my broom and down into the giant pit.

No, no, no! I won't die here! I refuse to lose!

The broom, I guess understanding what I wanted, flies under me and I roughly land on it before I fall any further.

Ouch. Rough landing but thanks Broom! You saved my life!

The set of bullets, even though I had potentially killed myself, continued to follow me into the pit zone.

I need a new strategy now. Comet Missile doesn't work against Parsee, so I need something new. More power. Not something I have right now though, but maybe...

"Nitori! I know how to break through that shield! I got a plan! How strong is your Blast Shield?"

_"My Blast Shield? You're not going to..." _She doubts on what I'm going to do, but I don't plan on using Master Spark here.

"We're gonna show her who has the better shield! I'm gonna crash against her again, but before I do, activate your Blast Shield. I'm gonna use Blast Shield with my Comet Missile! So get ready ze!" 2 moves in one! If this doesn't work, I'm gonna Master Spark Parsee afterwards. No other option, or anything that I can think of right off the top of my head.

"_O-ok! I'm ready_!" She sounds more determined now, that's good.

Then here I go! But you never answered on how strong Blast Shield was.

I begin my aerial ascent and zoom into the line of fire that is Parsee's Spell Card. My speed crushes through any of the smaller green bullets and I make sure to inch myself away from the bigger ones.

There she is!

"Go now! I don't know what to call this attack, but whatever!"

The green barrier flickers in front of me, signifying that Blast Shield has been activated and I lean onto the broom, all hell broken loose inside me.

**KA-BAM!**

I grit my teeth together as green took on white and I feel myself slowly getting closer, caving in the forcefield around her.

The sound of a car window breaking, fills my ears and it's Parsee's barrier that's breaking apart! I knew this would work!

As soon as it shatters completely, I let a victorious, cocky grin cover my face and brutally crash into a good part on her shoulder and fling right past her.

Haha! Taste how I feel!

I savor my revenge as she spins just like I did, falling onto the moist dirt below us.

The Blast Shield disappears around me and from the way Parsee isn't getting up, maybe it's over?

Nope, she's getting back up. Darn, I thought I had her there with one swift move and turnaround.

Taking another look at her, my double attack with Nitori looks like she took a huge chunk of hurt since she's taking a while to get up.

Before I even move, she jumps back into the air for combat again fires from what I remember, the same wave of bullets that Reisen shot at me! Except it's blue!

"You're shield... It's stronger than mine... I'm jealous. I want it."

Well you can't have it and I'm gonna get through this alive.

Going to the left! Sudden jerk to the right! Do it a couple times till I reach a clearing...

Now eat some of this!

Magic Missiles come forth again and she just as easily as I did, gets away from my own shots.

Even as she's obviously more damaged than me, she's shooting about 3 times more than me. But all my shots overpower hers, and she knows it.

Quality over quantity. Although, that may not be the right usage of it.

She's going to do something to change that though.

Or I should do something to just force her to do something else.

Like this!

Hakkero out! Narrow Spark!

Despite being cracked, the hakkero flashes normally and fires the same mini spark at her, dissipating anything in its way until it reaches Parsee.

Ha! She didn't see it coming at all! She dodged it, but she's stopped shooting! Time to move up!

As I near her, I realize I was slightly wrong on her dodging completely. It hit her other shoulder squarely, leaving a black mark on it.

She's open! Charge!

I use Comet Missile again to quickly gain distance against Parsee and it's too late for her to do anything.

As she side steps away from me, I miss by just a hair! Not just yet though!

Turning my head around, I fire another Narrow Spark, scoring a good shot against her as soon as I pass her.

And again, turning my whole broom to aim at Parsee, I pull the broom out from under me, 2-hand gripping it and smash her head downwards.

Parsee falls straight down, sure to land face flat onto the cave floor if she did not do anything. For good measures, I fire a few Magic Missiles at her and it hits her square in the back, boosting her faster towards the floor... before suddenly disappearing on me!

Where did she go?

**"{Tongue-Cut Sparrow "Hate for the Humble and Rich"}" **It comes from behind me and a giant green sphere knocks me right off of my broom.

Face-plant.

_"Hurry! Get up! Parsee and Parsee are shooting at you again!" _Double trouble!

Rolling to the side quickly, the same green sphere that hit me off the broom, blows up on the ground and several more of them come, followed by smaller ones.

I continuously roll to the side, ignoring the explosions and rocks that hit me where I previously was seconds ago.

**"{Grandpa Hanasaka "Jealous of the Kind and Lovely}" **Finally! That should cut the firepower in half!

Or not. There were still 2 Parsees, but this time, they each shoot a green orb towards me and the trail it follows, leaves behind different colored danmaku in the shape of 5-pronged flowers.

What, did they cheat or something? I thought you couldn't use 2 spell cards at the same time. Or did they somehow magically bypass it?

_"It must be because technically, they're both using the spell card at the same time."_

Oh now, that is just plain stupid.

Getting back up on my feet, I call the broom to me and extend my arm out for it to land into.

Success! Now let's fly!

Soaring back into the air and away from the warzone, the second Parsee shoots one at me, and I fly back down towards the ground.

The bullet flowers that were in the air change color with each one the Parsees were shooting and as they turn red, they split apart into smaller ones.

Avoiding them only got me so far and before long, I get trapped into a whole field of them. Ground-wise and Air-wise with no way to get through all of them.

There's too many of them! I need to clear them out for breathing room! Somehow.

Come on mind! Work faster or we'll get beaten!

My own mind isn't listening! Here comes another orb!

As I nudge just a little to the left, the bullets next to me, split apart and I flinch. Just one second of held down movement, and I immediately get pelted everywhere.

A thousand sharp rocks hit me all over from my arm to my feet and I struggle to stay on the broom and my line of sight.

"Nitori! I need a Blast Shield!" I cry out, desperate to get away from this harmful mass.

_"Hang on! I need a moment!"_

"We don't have a moment!" I yell out, holding in the urge to scream.

Three more seconds of pain come before finally, I don't feel anything.

Blast Shield is back up and anything that touches the barrier around me, immediately disperses into smaller, harmless fragments.

I know I shouldn't complain, but I wouldn't have minded the barrier a little earlier Nitori!

Now I'm free to get closer to them! These Parsees don't have anything to hit me hard enough with. First, I'll take out that left Parsee!

The giant green spheres are no match against Blast Shield so it doesn't stop my fast advance towards the first Parsee.

As I'm flying I feel something strange around me. My body is getting hot.

The bullets are getting slower and slower. I have perfect vision, and there's no way it can be.

I skirmish myself past all the bigger bullets that I deemed as threats and crushed any smaller ones. I break out of the hellhole and shoot myself towards at the target Parsee that I'm aiming for.

The Blast Shield breaks apart finally, but is absorbed by my unsaid Comet Missile.

Wait, when did I ever start glowing?

But I feel... absolutely amazing! Like I have all the power in the world surrounding me right now!

She panics and turns around to try and stay away, but I quickly gain up on her.

The split second I touch the Parsee, she instantly fades away into the burning force around me.

Now the other one!

But I can't turn around at all. My speed is my downfall and I put everything I have into stopping before I crash into the incoming wall, pulling upwards.

Ack! No! Stop now!

Now the broom puts everything it has (Whatever it has), to halt itself.

I'm slowing down now! Maybe I can... Yeah!

With my downtrodden speed, I regain control enough to pull up. Only now, seeing the ceiling, makes me panic and loop downwards towards the ground again.

As my adrenaline surge fades away, I suddenly feel incredibly tired from my Comet Missile.

How did it drain me so much? None of the other ones had this kind of effect on me.

Only one Parsee to deal with now. She's still trying to get distance from me.

For trial and error, I fly full speed at her again, not realizing that I'm emittingmy magic energy around me.

W-what is this? This feeling again. How do I stop this? If I do it again, I might get too tired to do anything else!

I slow myself down, noting on how it was fading away again. and Parsee decides to turn around at this point to see me hesitating.

So then...

_"{Comet "Blazing Star"}". _

"Huh? What was that?" I'm just confused now. Was this a move Marisa used sometime earlier?

_"Aya said you had this very straightforward move that wasn't anything danmaku related. This might be what she was talking about. All you do is fly at a high speed and blow through everything in your way with no control."_

"So then that's the move? Blazing Star?" I realize saying that was not a good idea at all. Not knowing my own moves sounded suspicious.

_"Huh? Y-you don't know your own spell card?_"

Balls. Whoever this Aya is, telling Nitori, you just caused me some bad luck.

I'll have to stop using Comet Missile temporarily since I don't know why I'm getting so tired using it now. Just great, now I'm down another attack.

**"{Malice Sign "Midnight Anathema Ritual"}" **First thing that comes in mind. Some kind of sacrifice.

This time, red shots come at me, but she's too slow shooting and aiming at me that I'm practically moving only feet by feet.

I'm not too far off on the sacrifice part. The initial red bullets disappear to form multiple blue spheres that come in the opposite direction from my backside.

It's not really aimed, so I have to be a bit more cautious.

I have the perfect counter. Taking out the initial bullets means lowering how much I have to get away from.

As some say. A good defense is a good offense.

"Attack! Attack! **{Magic Sign "Stardust Reverie"}"**

The seemingly infinite colorful and I might mention, cool looking star bullets easily overwhelm Parsee's Ritual. There's even too many for her to get away from, and she vainly tries to hurry out of my range.

Parsee is surrounded by the huge sea of beautiful stars, and I hear a girlish scream from her as all her bullets stop and diminish immediately.

Oh, there goes her body, falling down to the ground.

I stop my spell card, noting my second victory, technically third, of this incident. She's not getting back up now is she?

Nahhh.

I fly over to her, a confident smug look on my face that I can't erase, not that I'm going to.

I stand over her fallen body, but she's still conscious from the looks of her open eyes.

"Oh... I lost. You're stronger... I want some of that power." Even losing, you still ask for too much!

My oh so kind heart can't help but feel compelled to give her something.

What to give her now... Oh, how about the ribbon on my hat!

I untie it, and lay it on her flat chest (nosebleed).

"Y-you're giving this to me?" She sounds awfully surprised for getting a gift. You don't get much often huh.

"Yeah. If I give it to you, will you tell me which way leads down deeper? I'm kinda lost." Yes, I intend to bribe her! It works, sometimes.

"Thank...you. You see a bridge over there?" She raises her head and an arm to point towards a crappy looking bridge that looks just about to break down. No one sane would ever want to cross that.

I nod anyway and she continues. "Just cross it and you should enter a town. I have a friend that lives there named Yuugi. Please tell her hi and to visit me. It's so lonely under the bridge."

That's if I see her. Maybe this town will have a rest place.

Wait, maybe I'll find someone who could fix my hakkero!

Yeah! I'll have a look around in the town before I go ahead and move on then. Sounds like a good plan.

"Ok. If I see her, I'll let her know. But please, don't attack anybody else just because you're jealous. It doesn't sound like such a great habit. Keep the ribbon though." Maybe that's hoping for too much.

As I mount up and fly over the bridge, I turn back to see her sitting up and waving good-bye to me. I give her a friendly smile and a one eyed wink before heading over the bridge and deeper down,

I guess this ends stage 2! All right! 4 more to go and the Extra Stage!

... No wait, that's bad. I don't want to do the Extra Stage!

Uuuuu. What a pain in the butt.

_"Umm. Marisa?" _Uh-oh, it's the questioning stage.

"Yes? What is it?" Rock entering chest, heading down for my stomach. Horrendous feeling detected.

_"How come you didn't know your own spell card? Didn't you make Blazing Star?" _Aggh, noooo!

I'm so screwed! I'm at a complete blank and I can't improvise anything.

"Uhh... I got it from someone?" A weak attempt at covering that up. Not even an idiot would fall for that.

_"But I don't think anyone has that kind of attack except you."_ Oh man. Think of something damn it!

No answer. Game over.

_"You look so much like her. You're clothes are similar, but Marisa always wears black." _Doesn't she ever get hot out in the sun then? Better yet, does she wear anything else? I'd freaking overheat, wearing that all day.

_"And Marisa isn't desperate as much as you. So, who are you?" _I now officially fail at anything stage-related.

"It's a long story." I hope to delay a little bit more time.

_"It doesn't look like we're going to be at that town Parsee talked about for a while, so we have time." _Negated so fast.

A huge sigh leaves me. "Fine. Now where do I begin? Here, it starts out back during an incident with the full moon..."

Hoping Nitori will stay with me, it sounds like a bit much. I need all the help I can get and putting aside that she's my supposed killer, it's for the best right now.


End file.
